We are already beginning to prepare for a birthday. For us, as Church, it is the anniversary of Someone decisive in our lives. Someone who ended His days appearing before four tribunals in less than 24 hours, declaring Himself true Man, true God, supreme King, and Silence before a corrupt court. He was condemned to the most ignominious death: the cross. And buried.
To everyone’s astonishment — with confusion for some and joy for others — on the third day He rose, fulfilling His promise and becoming our definitive hope: “Christ Jesus, our hope” (1Tm 1:1).
This child who, thirty years later, presented His mission in Nazareth, His own village, as a message of hope for all who suffer, quoting Isaiah’s prophecy. During three years of public ministry, this is exactly what He did tirelessly.
And now we await “the blessed hope and the glorious manifestation of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ” (Tt 2:13).
Yet everything began with the birth of a child, the firstborn, awaited with joy and care, though He was born poor among the poor.
The small remnant of Israel awaited Him, together with the poor who welcomed Him immediately, for “the poor can become witnesses of a firm and reliable hope” (Leo XIV, World Day of the Poor 2025). And that hope was the newborn child.
Today we still continue “waiting”… “They will see the Son of Man coming…” (Mk 13:26).
And what attitudes are expected of those who wait? Above all, to believe in what they do; to remain faithful to the Master they await; to be awake, prepared, attentive.
To watch, to stay awake, to look inward, and to be attentive to the One who dwells within our hearts: “We will come to him and make our dwelling with him” (Jn 14:23).
But “whoever does not love his brother whom he sees cannot love God whom he does not see” (1Jn 4:20). We must therefore keep our eyes open to reality, to the brother near or far, whose painful stories we hear daily.
The Christian cannot enclose himself in his own spiritual comfort: he must approach his neighbour and “touch the suffering flesh of Christ” (Pope Francis; echoed by Leo XIV, Dilexi Te). The Spirit who dwells in us will grant us the creativity to find the concrete gesture. Let us ask for it.
What small task could help us bring hope during this Advent?
Reading the opening chapters of Luke, or delving into Pope Leo’s exhortation Dilexi Te.
Or listening to “Noche” by Hakuna and offering intercessory prayer.
And when the song evokes the mother giving birth, remembering Mary who had to lay her Son “in a manger, because there was no room for them in the lodging” (Lk 2:7).
And then, to GO OUT: for in going out, we will surely meet someone who needs our listening, our help, our understanding — simply some of our time — and we will have the beautiful opportunity to share our HOPE.
Soeur Maria Magdalena Castro
Collado Mediano, 25/11/2025