Main news for 20 August 2009

For us, living after the Nativity has become an accomplished fact, it is important to feel the expectation of Christ's coming by which many generations of people lived. Among other things, we need to remember that the life of those people differed little from ours, except that the technology was different. The ancients were tormented by the same moral problems, frightened by the same things that frighten us, and labored just as hard to earn their scant bread by the sweat of their brow. Therefore the salvation that the Lord promised His people and the whole world with the coming of Christ is just as necessary for us today as it was for the prophet Jeremiah at the end of the seventh century before Christ.

Jeremiah conveys to us the Word from the Lord, in which he singles out several important things. First, Christ, the descendant of David, will be a righteous Branch. The point is that Jeremiah utters this prophecy under the successors of King Josiah, people extremely unattractive from both a moral and even a political point of view. Shortly before this, the Lord had told Jeremiah that because of the sins of its members, the dynasty of David's descendants would soon cease and would never reign again. Only the Messiah, a descendant of one of the lines of this dynasty, would be the righteous Branch, but His righteousness is of divine origin.

Second, in contrast to the earthly power of David's descendants, Christ will be a king who acts wisely. Jeremiah says this when the rulers of his country seem to be competing with one another in madness. Earthly power in general is rarely distinguished by wise care for people's good, and we know this no less than the ancient Israelites did... Therefore the contrast proposed by the prophet is so important: the wisdom of Christ the King, who will lead people to life.

Finally, the prophet emphasizes that the coming of Christ will bring "judgment and righteousness" into the world. Christ Himself says that He has brought light into the world, in which all human deeds became visible, and this is what judgment consists in. But it is no less important for us that the light of Christ illumines for all His disciples the path of life, and judgment and righteousness become the reality of the lives of concrete people.