Sunday Homily, 14 December 2025 - Fr Paul Rowse, OP

The Baptist’s question from prison speaks to his prophet’s faith: the one for whom John is waiting is no less than the Christ of God, whom he believes will clearly identify himself.  That is a justifiable position.  All through his life with his own parents and then in the wilderness as hermit and master of disciples, John has been expecting the Christ.  His natural gifts and the Holy Spirit’s presence in his life have led him to this crucial point: this may be the Christ.

John’s question is pressing because the ransom and liberty of prisoners like him will be the Christ’s doing.  The last of the prophets may well be hearing the footsteps of Herod’s executioner getting louder.  It is as if John is asking what is taking Jesus so long: If you are the Christ, why am I in prison?

Certainly, John could be forgiven for any apparent mistake.  It is unclear, for example, whether the prophet Isaiah says mighty works on those with disability will precede or follow God’s Advent.  In our First Reading, it seems the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf will be healed simply after the announcement, “Your God is coming”.  And so, there is confusion about whether Christ’s mighty works are the sign or effect of his Advent.  If the mighty works are the sign of God’s Advent, the Christ is still a way off yet; if they are the effect of them, he is already with us.

Whatever good there is in John’s school, it has not given the master and his disciples the ability to recognise the Christ.  If you like, they can tell you what the Christ does but they cannot point him out in a crowd.  So, we are seeing here the limits of prophecy: John, sitting in the darkness of his prison cell, abides in a much deeper darkness – the darkness of the First Advent, the long waiting of all-humanity for Jesus.

And so, from his prison cell and from his prophet’s sombre faith, John sends his disciples out with his question: “Are you the one who is to come?”

But the Lord doesn’t answer John’s question.  He answers John’s disciples with direct teaching for them: “Go back and tell John what you see and hear.”  Sure, they faithfully posed their master’s question.  But when they convey the answer to him, they will be the master; they will be greater than John is.  If John was asking what is taking Jesus so long, Jesus is all-but-asking why they were asking master’s question in the first place.  If those who are free could only see what the Lord is doing, then they will have an answer for those who doubt: look around you for what you seek.

So, the Lord’s answer preserves John’s faith and invites him to deepen it.  Far from suppressing faith, the Lord’s Advent increases in us the things that faith does: to trust more deeply in God because God in Christ is proving himself trustworthy, to honour his beloved poor not just because of their need but also because they are where he will be, and finally to understand God’s sometimes mysterious ways.

This joyful Sunday, which is past the halfway point to Christmas, is our opportunity to consider our trust in Jesus as the Christ.  Can you distinguish the voice of Christ resounding in your life from your own opinion, your judgements, your decision-making, your inspiration?  I do hope so.  It is not always easy to do, but it is the task before us.  If we are to move on from feeling to sight, from expectation to reception, from being John’s disciples to being Jesus’ disciples, we must be able to recognise Christ in our own life.

The voice of Jesus can be distinguished by its peacefulness and coherence with all-truth.  What Jesus is asking of you will be what he has always wanted and provided: a new people, whose individual members are not born into it but adopted by faith and baptism; a new humanity, in which every person is saved by grace through faith; a new assembly of men and women, whose bonds of mutual love are so strong as to be called the communion of saints.  Anything which does not cohere with those realities is not from Christ.

If we, who enjoy the liberty John longed for, can deepen our faith and trust in Jesus at this time, we shall have much to offer others who are imprisoned in the Baptist’s doubts.  If we, who appreciate Christ’s work in the way John’s disciples did not, can persevere with his Church, we shall show the way to glory.  Being uncertain about Jesus because he has not yet removed all sickness, sin, and death is understandable.  But it is necessary to use all that we know about Jesus to keep up faith in him to wait for him with patience.  He is doing great things among us: he is calling people into the Church, renewing those who are weary, preparing us all for his coming with joy.

If we do believe that Jesus is the Christ and follow his peaceful rule and coherent direction in our life, and so enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, then we shall be greater even than John the Baptist.

Fr Paul Rowse, OP Parish Priest