Thursday of the Second Week of Advent, Year B
Memorial of St John of the Cross
Daily Readings: Isaiah 41:13-20; Psalm 144(145): 1, 9-13; Matthew 11:11-15
Memorial Readings: 1 Corinthians 2:1-10; Psalm 36(37):3-6, 30-31; Luke 14:25-33
14 December 2023
“Amen, I say to you, among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” – Matthew 11:11
In today’s Gospel, Jesus says to the crowds, “From the days of John the Baptist until now, the Kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent are taking it by force.” The title for Flannery O’Connor’s irresistibly powerful second and final novel, The Violent Bear It Away, is taken from the Douay-Rheims translation of this last phrase.
This famously ambiguous passage has given rise to a variety of interpretations over the centuries. Many have taken it to mean that the kingdom of God is attacked by violent people (such as those who killed John the Baptist) and that they threaten to take it away. But others have interpreted it in the opposite direction, as a word of praise to the spiritually violent who manage to get into the kingdom. Flannery O’Connor herself sides with this latter group.
The “violent” on this reading, are those spiritually heroic types who resist the promptings and tendencies of our fallen nature and seek to discipline it in various ways in order to enter into the kingdom of God.
Pray for the ability to fight for our souls!
With thanks to Holy Name of Mary Parish, Hunters Hill, who have supplied these daily Advent and Christmas 2022 reflections from their publication Daily Inspirations of Faith: A Season of Prayer – Advent to Epiphany 2023-2024.
