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Sacred Scriptures/Liturgy- Commentary on Sunday's Readings |
John the
Baptist: Prophet of the Most High
Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, OFMCap, Pontifical Household Preacher
Second Sunday of Advent 2006 (C)
www.zenit.org
Baruch 5:1-9; Philippians
1:4-6,8-11; Luke 3:1-6
This Sunday's Gospel is concerned entirely with the figure of John
the Baptist. From the moment of his birth John the Baptist was
greeted by his father as a prophet: "And you, child, will be called
prophet of the Most High because you will go before the Lord to
prepare the ways for him" (Luke 1:76).
What did the precursor do to be defined as a prophet, indeed, "the
greatest of the prophets" (cf. Luke 7:28)? First of all, in the line
of the ancient prophets of Israel, he preached against oppression
and social injustice. In Sunday's Gospel we can hear him say: "He
who has two tunics must give one to him who has none; and he who has
something to eat must do likewise."
To the tax collectors who so often drained away the money of the
poor with arbitrary requests, he says: "Do not mistreat anyone or
commit extortion" (Luke 3:11-14). There are also the sayings about
making the mountains low, raising up the valleys, and straightening
the crooked pathways. Today we could understand them thus: "Every
unjust social difference between the very rich (the mountains) and
the very poor (the valleys) must be eliminated or at least reduced;
the crooked roads of corruption and deception must be made
straight."
Up to this point we can easily recognize our contemporary
understanding of a prophet: one who pushes for change; who denounces
the injustices of the system, who points his finger against power in
all its forms – religious, economic, military – and dares to cry out
in the face of the tyrant: "It is not right!" (Matthew 14:4).
But there is something else that John the Baptist does: He gives to
the people "a knowledge of salvation, of the remission of their
sins" (Luke 1:77). Where, we might ask ourselves, is the prophecy in
this case? The prophets announced a future salvation; but John the
Baptist does not announce a future salvation; he indicates a
salvation that is now present. He is the one who points his finger
toward the person and cries out: "Behold, here it is" (John 1:29).
"That which was awaited for centuries and centuries is here, he is
the one!" What a tremor must have passed though those present who
heard John speak thus!
The traditional prophets helped their contemporaries look beyond the
wall of time and see into the future, but John helps the people to
look past the wall of contrary appearances to make them see the
Messiah hidden behind the semblance of a man like others. The
Baptist in this way inaugurated the new Christian form of prophecy,
which does not consist in proclaiming a future salvation ("in the
last times"), but to reveal the hidden presence of Christ in the
world.
What does all of this have to say to us? That we too must hold
together those two aspects of the office of prophet: On one hand
working for social justice and on the other announcing the Gospel. A
proclamation of Christ that is not accompanied by an effort toward
human betterment would result in something disincarnate and lacking
credibility. If we only worked for justice without the proclamation
of faith and without the regenerative contact with the word of God,
we would soon come to our limits and end up mere protestors.
From John the Baptist we also learn that proclamation of the Gospel
and the struggle for justice need not remain simply juxtaposed,
without a link between them. It must be precisely the Gospel of
Christ that moves us to fight for respect for human beings in such a
way as to make it possible for each man to "see the salvation of
God." John the Baptist did not preach against abuses as a social
agitator but as a herald of the Gospel "to make ready for the Lord a
people well prepared" (Luke 1:17).
[Translation by ZENIT]
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