Tuesday of the first week of Advent: With Christ in the Desert

Presence

“The world is charged with the grandeur of God.” (Gerard Manley Hopkins)
I dwell for a moment on the presence of God around me, in every part of my body,
and deep within my being.

Scripture

Mark 1:9-13

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove upon him. And a voice came from the heavens, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”
And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tested by Satan, and he was with the wild beasts, and the angels waited on him.

Reflection

The following reflection by Fr Francis X Clooney, SJ, appeared in the Jesuit publication, America Magazine, on 26 February 2012:
“Think about it: after and not before his Baptism, the descent of the Spirit upon him, and the heavenly voice, but before he begins to preach, Jesus goes to the desert. It is as if he must be alone, to understand the gift he has already received. Or rather, he does not go of his own free will, but “driven by the Spirit.” My thought, when I preached this morning, is that we might try this approach … wait upon the Spirit, and see where the Spirit drives us, in terms of aloneness, prayer, penance, desert and abundance…
“Mark does not mention fasting, nor does he play up the riguors of the desert, the heat and cold, the dryness, etc. All he says is that Jesus was “with the wild beasts.” While this might be an oblique reference to Psalm 91, the simple words do us well: to be where the wild beasts are, outside civilization, beyond the bounds of what we ordinarily do and ordinarily expect. With the beasts – metaphorically, perhaps, the wilder parts of ourselves, parts we might ordinarily be afraid of: our desires or lusts, our angers or fears, our depressions or unruly dreams…
“Mark makes no mention of three temptations, and we can leave that famous trio aside. All we hear is that Jesus was “tempted by Satan” and “waited upon by angels.” It is as if Jesus, alone in that desert to which the Spirit drove him, patiently with his wild beasts, is tempted and consoled, dragged toward the dark and invited back into the light, back and forth, opposing forces drawing him this way and that, as he watched, observing all that happened. This is, of course, something familiar from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius: observe your desolations and consolations; notice where Satan implicates himself in your life; and rejoice in the small and subtle gifts of ministering angels.”

Prayer

Lord, this Advent help me to be with my inner beasts – not against them, nor hunting them, nor clinging to them, nor fleeing from them. Help me, in the Ignatian way observe my desolations and consolations; notice where Satan implicates himself in my life; and rejoice in the small and subtle gifts of ministering angels in the confidence that in all of this, you will speak to me.

Amen

Glory to you, Father, source of all being,

to you, Jesus, Word made flesh,

to you Holy Spirit, Comforter,

as it was before time began,

is now and shall be into the future.

Amen.