Advent 2024: Peace is Inheriting the Reign

Fr Antony Christy, SDB –

Second Thursday in Advent – December 12, 2024
Isaiah 41: 13-20; Matthew 11: 11-15

We began this week with the prophecy about the voice in the wilderness, John the Baptist and the readings prepare us to encounter the person of the prophet, the greatest of all born of women! It is very clear that John is brought in to underscore the proximity of the coming of the Lord. And what Jesus seems to say is, the ultimate aim of everything that we say or do, is to arrive at the Reign, to inherit the Reign – by doing that, we become no less than the great Baptist himself.

So, what do we do? Not much! Because the Reign is God’s doing, says the first reading. In that short passage of the reading, we see a rampant self-reference of God – I the Lord, I will do, I will help… it is simply a means to make us understand how the Reign of God, is God’s making. All that we can do is, listen, cooperate, and behold the Reign. Those who do that, inherit the Reign, they inherit peace!

We could fret to do a million things and finally feel helplessly empty when we are up to our own designs. That is what the world suggests today in the name of self-realisation! But what is important is that we choose God, and choose God’s designs with a trust that God shall work everything out in God’s right time, and we shall experience peace, we shall inherit the Reign.


Fr Antony Christy is a Salesian Priest from 2005 and has a Masters in Philosophy (specialisation in Religion) and a Masters in Theology (specialisation in Catechetics). He has a Doctorate in Theology with specialisation in Catechetics and youth ministry at Salesian Pontifical University, Rome. Walking with the young towards a World of Peace and dialogue is the passion that fires him.

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