Mark 13:33-37 (NRSV Updated Edition)
“But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert, for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Therefore, keep awake, for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening or at midnight or at cockcrow or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.”
~
"[In the discourse starting at Mark 13:3, Jesus has] explained all the forms of, if you like, chaos and catastrophe that are going to be the new normal in the wake of his performing the definitive sacrifice that brings the temple to an end, brings the sacrificial world to an end, [when] there'll be nothing to solve the problems of human violence. [The disciples are] going to be carrying on, and it's going to be very very difficult for them not to be distracted by all these fake sources of meaning, very difficult for them not to be distracted from the presence of the One who is coming, the coming in of the Son of Man.
"So he's preparing them for living in that time. ... In our time, just as for them, so for us, the the threat of being distracted by so much violence, so much fake meaning, being jostled about giving us a sense that something great is about to happen, or not, and yet all of that distracts us from having our eyes trained on the One who is coming in.
...
"First of all was the word going [(v. 34), then] “You do not know when the master will come, in the evening or at midnight or at cockcrow or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly.” Now of course very beautifully Jesus sets up those four times which are going to be very specifically the times at which [the disciples] to whom he is talking does not see the coming of the master in his going, because in the evening Jesus hands himself over to them in the form of the Last Supper, setting up the Eucharist; at midnight while they're all asleep in the garden of Gethsemane ... while they are asleep suddenly Judas arrives and Jesus is handed over, it's the second handing over; then at cockcrow Peter hands over Jesus, Peter betrays Jesus, he denies him in the courtyard of the High Priest; and at dawn the Sanhedrin hands Jesus over to the Romans.
"So every single one of the moments of the Son of Man coming, looking in fact exactly like he's going, but a particular sort of going, the sort of going that is a handing over and going out of being: a 'self-giving up out of being'; a 'violent being taken out of being'; a 'being betrayed out of being', a 'being dismissed as part of political convenience going out of being'. In every single one of those the coming looks like a going.
"And guess what? This happens in the few days immediately after Jesus has explained this to those [disciples] which is why it's tremendously important that he then says, “What i say to you I say to all: keep awake.” Why? Because these [disciples] get it wrong! This is the wonderful thing about the gospel - Jesus is setting up his disciples to get it wrong, to fail to perceive the coming. Why? So that they can then bear witness to us of what it looks like to be a failure, so that little by little we may all learn to get it right through failing. This is the wonder of the gospel: it's mercy for screw-ups not correctness for those who want to be right. This is what's being offered here: how we are going to be able, despite our failures, to come back time and again to having our eyes trained on the coming, to be able to see one going out of being.
"So think of what we're celebrating in the Mass as being a calling to mind this glorious failure. Jesus actually is setting up the watchmen to have failed at the very first go, so that we are able to bear witness to that - they're able to bear witness to us and we are then able to continue to bear witness as we gradually with great difficulty learn to be able to see the coming of the Son of Man in his going.
...
"So that is what is going on in Advent: this extraordinary shape of the mercy of God coming into our midst. We're being trained to observe it, to observe and to be taken on board by it, so that we can become living representatives of it. That means working through a whole lot of our projections of anger, of vengeance, of punishment, onto God, because our expectation is of someone who comes in to sort things out... [in] a rough way, [to] punish people. But in fact the one who comes is going to constantly surprise by the failure to be part of vengeance. That is going to be, if you like, the most difficult thing for us to perceive, that's the thing that's most completely going to fox us. So that we receive the mercy at this time of Advent of learning once again that the one who comes, comes in gentleness and precariousness. So that we can perceive his coming and his giving of himself away."
- James Alison, "Homily for the First Sunday in Advent Year B" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YATO41e51_c)
[For discussion and resources on all of this week's lectionary texts, see: http://girardianlectionary.net/reflections/year-b/advent1b/]
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