'Watch!' 1st Sunday in Advent Year B, 27 November 2011

Women at prayer in Aušros Vartai (Gate of Dawn), Vilnius, Lithuania

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

 
Gospel Mark 13:33-37 (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Jesus said to his disciples:
"Be watchful! Be alert!
You do not know when the time will come.
It is like a man traveling abroad.
He leaves home and places his servants in charge,
each with his own work,
and orders the gatekeeper to be on the watch.
Watch, therefore;
you do not know when the Lord of the house is coming,
whether in the evening, or at midnight,
or at cockcrow, or in the morning.
May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping.
What I say to you, I say to all: 'Watch!'"

Icon of Our Lady at Gate of Dawn

My father, John, 'upped and died', as we say in Ireland, on 11 August 1987 at the age of 74. He had a heart attack while watching cricket on television in the late afternoon, something the Columban Superior General at the time, Fr Bernard Cleary, an Australian, found amusing.He just had time to call my brother, who was about to go out, get to his bed and lie down before he became unconscious.

In our part of Dublin there was one priest on call every day for emergencies in a group of parishes. My father had placed the emerency number, in large digits, and placed t on top of the phone. My brother phoned immediately. It happened that the priest on call was from our parish and was less than five minutes' walk away. The particular priest, though young, wasn't noted for his speed but he was over in no time at all to anoint Dad before the ambulance arrived. However, Dad was dead on arrival at the hospital. He died 17 years after my mother, Mary, who passed away in her sleep.

When I got the news of his death in the middle of the night in Cebu I was shocked. But not for a moment did I feel any regret over things not done. There was no 'unfinished business'. I was consoled when I learned that the priest had been with him but even more consoled knowing that he had been at Mass that morning, as he had been every day of his adult life.

He had no idea when the Lord would come for him. When he found my mother dead in bed he said to my brother, 'Your mother has gone now and we have to adjust to this. His strong faith enabled him to do that. That same faith prepared him for his own sudden death and prepared us, his two sons, to adjust to that new reality with grief, yes, but with no regrets, no 'unfinished business'.

'May he not come suddenly and find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to all "Watch!"'

On my ordination day, 20 December 1967, with my parents and brother.

Communion antiphon



Dóminus dabit benignitátem, et terra nostra dabit fructum suum (Ps 84:13).

The Lord will bestow his bounty, and our earth shall yield its increase.