Second Tuesday of Advent
Scripture Reading for Today:
Psalm 27
A psalm of David.1 The Lord is my light and my salvation— so why should I be afraid? The Lord is my fortress, protecting me from danger, so why should I tremble? 2 When evil people come to devour me, when my enemies and foes attack me, they will stumble and fall. 3 Though a mighty army surrounds me, my heart will not be afraid. Even if I am attacked, I will remain confident. 4 The one thing I ask of the Lord— the thing I seek most— is to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, delighting in the Lord’s perfections and meditating in his Temple. 5 For he will conceal me there when troubles come; he will hide me in his sanctuary. He will place me out of reach on a high rock. 6 Then I will hold my head high above my enemies who surround me. At his sanctuary I will offer sacrifices with shouts of joy, singing and praising the Lord with music. 7 Hear me as I pray, O Lord. Be merciful and answer me! 8 My heart has heard you say, “Come and talk with me.” And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.” 9 Do not turn your back on me. Do not reject your servant in anger. You have always been my helper. Don’t leave me now; don’t abandon me, O God of my salvation! 10 Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close. 11 Teach me how to live, O Lord. Lead me along the right path, for my enemies are waiting for me. 12 Do not let me fall into their hands. For they accuse me of things I’ve never done; with every breath they threaten me with violence. 13 Yet I am confident I will see the Lord’s goodness while I am here in the land of the living. 14 Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.
Isaiah 4:2-6
A Promise of Restoration2 But in that day, the branch of the Lord will be beautiful and glorious; the fruit of the land will be the pride and glory of all who survive in Israel. 3 All who remain in Zion will be a holy people— those who survive the destruction of Jerusalem and are recorded among the living. 4 The Lord will wash the filth from beautiful Zion and cleanse Jerusalem of its bloodstains with the hot breath of fiery judgment. 5 Then the Lord will provide shade for Mount Zion and all who assemble there. He will provide a canopy of cloud during the day and smoke and flaming fire at night, covering the glorious land. 6 It will be a shelter from daytime heat and a hiding place from storms and rain.
Acts 11:1-18
Peter Explains His Actions11 Soon the news reached the apostles and other believers in Judea that the Gentiles had received the word of God. 2 But when Peter arrived back in Jerusalem, the Jewish believers criticized him. 3 “You entered the home of Gentiles and even ate with them!” they said. 4 Then Peter told them exactly what had happened. 5 “I was in the town of Joppa,” he said, “and while I was praying, I went into a trance and saw a vision. Something like a large sheet was let down by its four corners from the sky. And it came right down to me. 6 When I looked inside the sheet, I saw all sorts of tame and wild animals, reptiles, and birds. 7 And I heard a voice say, ‘Get up, Peter; kill and eat them.’ 8 “‘No, Lord,’ I replied. ‘I have never eaten anything that our Jewish laws have declared impure or unclean.’ 9 “But the voice from heaven spoke again: ‘Do not call something unclean if God has made it clean.’ 10 This happened three times before the sheet and all it contained was pulled back up to heaven. 11 “Just then three men who had been sent from Caesarea arrived at the house where we were staying. 12 The Holy Spirit told me to go with them and not to worry that they were Gentiles. These six brothers here accompanied me, and we soon entered the home of the man who had sent for us. 13 He told us how an angel had appeared to him in his home and had told him, ‘Send messengers to Joppa, and summon a man named Simon Peter. 14 He will tell you how you and everyone in your household can be saved!’ 15 “As I began to speak,” Peter continued, “the Holy Spirit fell on them, just as he fell on us at the beginning. 16 Then I thought of the Lord’s words when he said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ 17 And since God gave these Gentiles the same gift he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to stand in God’s way?” 18 When the others heard this, they stopped objecting and began praising God. They said, “We can see that God has also given the Gentiles the privilege of repenting of their sins and receiving eternal life.”
NLT
Listening on a Tuesday
David H Pereyra is an architect, doctor in Theology, researcher at the OCAD University in Toronto, and seasonal Professor at the University of St Michael’s College in the University of Toronto, Canada. For over two decades Pereyra’s personal interests and academic focus centres on interdisciplinary aspects of our multicultural society, as expressed through art, music, film, worship, multimedia, technology and sacred spaces. He is particularly interested in sacred spaces as iconic points of reference that provide unique meanings to the collective memory of a culture, and how creative experiences of transmitting information and communication can reach users and vice-versa. His Latin American, European and North American multi-cultural background greatly enrich his experience of the world and his scholarly work. His area of expertise is the trans-disciplinary study and comparison of phenomenological and theological aspects in architecture and ritual, in a multidimensional perspective, across art forms, place and space.
The subtle invitation of the readings for this second Tuesday of Advent is to “listen.” But, to listen on a Tuesday? Tuesday is a day of the week that finds us in full activity. It is not Monday when we start the week and plan for the days to come. It is not a Wednesday or Thursday when we are in the middle of the week to see how we are doing. Finally, it is not a Saturday or a Sunday where we evaluate the week, we give thanks, and we recover. It is simply a Tuesday. In any event, today's readings invite us to “listen.”
If there is a verb that stands out throughout all the Holy Scriptures, it is the verb “to listen.” As a verb, “listen” indicates an action or request to do something. Sometimes the subject is God “Hear my voice when I call, Lord; be merciful to me and answer me” (Psalm 27:7); and other times the subject is His people “Shema Israel!” (Hear, O Israel) (Deuteronomy, 6:4). God asks us to listen to His word, and we ask God to listen to our prayers.
When God “listens,” it means that He has granted something, “There has never been a day like it before or since, a day when the Lord listened to a human being. Surely the Lord was fighting for Israel!” (Josh 10:14). When we “listen,” it means that we draw consequences from those we listen to, “As for everyone who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like” (Luke 6:47).
Psalm 27 immerses us in listening from our heart: “My heart says of you, ‘Seek his face!’” (Psalm 27:8). For me, it is an invitation to remember those times of our faith when we felt called by the Lord. It is listening to the request of the beloved, “seek my face,” and answering him, “Your face, Lord, I will seek. Do not hide your face from me,” (Psalm 27:9). It is “the” face of the Lord that captivated us.
Isaiah tells us that “the survivors of Jerusalem will be called saints.” (Isaiah 4:3) Another powerful verb “to call” related “to listen.” I am called to be..., you are called to be..., we are called to be..., they will be called holy. To be holy is to be set apart. It is having the feeling of belonging to God. “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine” (Song of Solomon 6:3). But, who is called to be holy on a Tuesday? You will tell me, “anyone can be called to be holy, any day of the week.” And it is true when that happens. In general, that happens, in exceptional circumstances, but today on Tuesday? When it seems that nothing extraordinary happens on Tuesdays. Nevertheless, we are being called, but perhaps we are no longer listening due to the noise surrounding us.
The Book of the Acts narrates a tense history of the Early Church, maybe a story on a Tuesday. The narrator does not say that it is the Lord's Day. However, much and more happened, and it all involved “listening.” “The apostles and the believers throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God” (Acts 11:1). Here, we see “listening” as a rumour; it is not the one that builds community; we know this very well. Then, we read that the one who listens is Peter, and hears the criticism. Peter begins to explain, he feels like one more of his brothers and sisters, to whom it is just and necessary to give reasons for his deeds, “Starting from the beginning, Peter told them the whole story” (Acts 11:5). In explaining, the community “listens.” And what he tells you is that he “listened” to a voice from heaven. Saying at the end, “‘Do not call anything impure that God has made clean’” (Acts 11:10). Peter taught them how he had to listen, and maybe, it was a Tuesday. Captivated by God, Peter does not stop listening, and God goes on and on talking to Peter, and he listens. An outstanding sentence closes our three readings today, “When they heard these things, they held their peace, and glorified God, [so that we can listen to this on a Tuesday] saying, ‘Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life.’”
Regardless of what day of the week it is, one listens deeply when we are in love. My friend Ernesto once told me, “David, the most wonderful thing that can happen to you in life is to fall in love, but it is even more wonderful to be reciprocated, when the one you love, he or she loves you.” The lover listens to his or her beloved no matter what day of the week it is. Saint John of the Cross and Saint Teresa of Avila left us beautiful testimonies of not having a Tuesday or Thursday to listen to our beloved Lord.
Today, this Tuesday, we are called to listen to our brothers and sisters as Peter did; it is there where our Lord dwells. All these months of forced isolation have been an invitation to be more attentive to my family and friends distributed in different parts of the world, calling and listening to them. Technology allowed me to do it quickly, also Today, a Tuesday. Why wait for the weekend when I run the risk of forgetting? You, my reader, why not call someone today, Tuesday and listen to them? I am sure our beloved Lord will tell you something about His advent.
- David Pereyra
Liturgy Seminar Coordinator at the Toronto School of Theology
http://tst-liturgy-seminar.blogspot.com/
Our Doors Are Open Coordinator at OCAD University
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