Episode 3318: Christmas and Christ Hidden in Every Page of Scripture - Part 3

December 5, 2025

St Andrews Novena
Hail and blessed be the hour and moment
in which the Son of God was born
of the most pure Virgin Mary,
at midnight, in Bethlehem, in piercing cold.
In that hour vouchsafe, I beseech Thee, O my God,
to hear my prayer and grant my desires,
through the merits of Our Savior Jesus Christ,
and of His Blessed Mother. Amen.
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Book Recommendation of the Day
St. Leo the Great: Sermons on the Nativity
Traditional, majestic, doctrinally precise perfect for Advent preaching.

“The Incarnation and the Second Coming: Advent as Warning, Judgment, and Hope”

The early Church Fathers, the Roman liturgy, and centuries of Catholic tradition agree:

If you do not understand the Second Coming, you cannot understand the First.

And yet, in our age of comfort, sentimentality, and soft religion, the theme of judgment has all but vanished.
Advent has been reduced to candles, carols, and cozy imagery.

But the Traditional Catholic Faith restores Advent to what it truly is:

A season of warning.

A season of preparation.
A season of purification.
A season of holy fear.

Christ came once in silence.
He will come again in fire.

SEGMENT 1 : THE FIRST COMING: HUMILITY AND HIDDENNESS

When God entered the world at Bethlehem:
• He came quietly.
• He came poor.
• He came small.
• He came hidden from the powerful and known only to the humble.

St. Augustine says:
“He came in His first Advent hidden in the manger; He will come again, manifest in the heavens.”

Every detail of the Nativity Bethlehem, the manger, the shepherds reveals the humility of God.

But this is only half of the story.

SEGMENT 2 — THE SECOND COMING: GLORY AND JUDGMENT

Traditional Catholic theology teaches three comings of Christ:
1. In the flesh at Bethlehem.
2. In grace to the soul.
3. In glory at the end of time.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux writes:
“We know of a threefold coming of the Lord… His final coming will be seen in majesty.”

And what will this coming look like?

The Fathers describe it plainly:
• Thunder.
• Angelic trumpets.
• The heavens torn open.
• The dead rising.
• Christ appearing as Judge and King.

No swaddling clothes.
No manger.
No silence.

Only glory, power, and justice.

This is why Advent readings in the Traditional Latin Mass begin with:
• The end of the world
• The signs in the heavens
• The terror of judgment
• Christ coming on the clouds

Before Christmas, Holy Mother Church confronts us with the apocalypse.

Because unless you understand that Christ will judge,
you cannot appreciate that Christ first came to save.

SEGMENT 3: WHY MODERN CHRISTIANITY HIDES THE SECOND COMING

In the “nice” version of Christianity preached today:
• Christ never judges.
• Everyone is presumed saved.
• Sin is excused.
• Hell is ignored.
• Repentance is rarely mentioned.
• Advent is reduced to shopping and sentiment.

But the Traditional Catholic understanding is different:
It is serious, sobering, realistic, and supernatural.

Why does modern religion hide judgment?

Because judgment demands conversion.
Judgment demands moral clarity.
Judgment demands fidelity to Tradition.
Judgment demands obedience to Christ the King.

A Christianity without judgment is a Christianity without power.

A Christmas without the Second Coming becomes sentimentalism a warm story rather than the beginning of the war for souls.

SEGMENT 4: ADVENT: THE WARNING BEFORE THE STORM

The Church gives us the season of Advent as a wake-up call:
• Prepare your soul.
• Examine your conscience.
• Confess your sins.
• Return to Tradition.
• Live in a state of grace.
• Watch, because you do not know the day nor the hour.

The imagery of Advent is meant to shake us awake:

The axe laid to the root of the tree.

The Bridegroom approaching at midnight.

The heavens shaken.

The Judge at the door.

This is not meant to frighten the faithful
but to remind us that we were created for eternity.

SEGMENT 5 — THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE FIRST AND SECOND COMINGS

Why does the Church place the apocalypse at the beginning of Advent?

Because the First Coming means nothing if we are unprepared for the Second.

The crib points to the Cross.
The Cross points to the Altar.
The Altar points to the Parousia.

Bethlehem is the opening chapter of the divine drama that concludes with:
• the resurrection of the dead,
• the final judgment,
• the restoration of all creation,
• and the eternal reign of Christ the King.

In the Traditional Latin Mass, every Advent prayer whispers:

“He is coming.”

Not just the Infant.
The Judge.
The King.
The One whose eyes are flames of fire.

SEGMENT 6: A CALL TO TRADITIONAL CATHOLICS: PREPARE THE WAY

Here is the heart of Part 3:

Advent is a call to action.

Not emotional anticipation.
Not holiday spirituality.
Not cultural Catholicism.

But conversion.

Traditional Catholics must:
• return to frequent confession
• embrace fasting and penance
• restore reverence for the Eucharist
• cling to the Traditional Latin Mass
• study Scripture with the Fathers
• practice devotion to Our Lady
• live as though Christ could return today

Because the truth is simple:

He will come again.

Every prophecy pointing to Bethlehem also points to the end of time.

CONCLUSION — THE GOD WHO COMES

The Christ who once came quietly
will return loudly.

The Christ who once hid His glory
will reveal it in full.

The Christ who once allowed Himself to be judged
will judge the nations.

And Advent places us at the crossroads of both mysteries.
To understand the First Coming,
you must prepare for the Second.

THE EPISTLE
Romans 13:11–14
“Now is the hour for us to rise from sleep.”
St. Paul speaks to us with urgency
not gentle advice,
not soft encouragement,
but a wake-up call from the battlefield.
Advent is not sentimental;
it is martial.
“It is now the hour for us to rise from sleep.”
This “sleep” is spiritual drowsiness the deadly comfort of sin, distraction, worldliness, and lukewarmness.
Three Reflections on the Epistle
1. The night is ending: the dawn is coming.
“The night is far spent; the day is at hand.”
This is not about the natural world
it is about the eternal world.
The night represents:
• the reign of sin
• the age of unbelief
• the darkness of the world
• the temptation to spiritual laziness
The “day” is Christ Himself
His coming, His judgment, His kingdom.
Advent is the moment when we begin to see the sky lighten, and the Church tells us:
Prepare. He is coming.
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2. Cast off the works of darkness.
Paul lists them plainly:
• revelry
• drunkenness
• impurity
• immodesty
• contention
• jealousy
He is not vague.
He is not modern.
He is not avoiding offense.
He speaks like a spiritual father
to children who must awaken or perish.
The Advent message is clear:

You cannot wait for the Light while clinging to darkness.

3. “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”
This is the heart of Advent spirituality.
To “put on Christ” means:
• to pray with greater intensity
• to practice purity of mind and body
• to reject all compromise
• to embrace sacrifice
• to love silence
• to live as though Christ were coming today

St. Sabas lived this line literally.
He “put on Christ” by stripping away all earthly attachments
and seeking only God.

SEGMENT 2 — THE GOSPEL
Luke 21:25–33
“Then shall they see the Son of Man coming with great power and majesty.”

Today’s Gospel shifts the tone from interior conversion
to cosmic anticipation.

Christ describes signs that will shake the world:
• distress among nations
• roaring seas
• heavenly upheaval
• fear gripping men’s hearts

These are not decorations.

They are warnings.

Three Reflections on the Gospel

1. The end of the world is not a symbol it is a reality.
Christ speaks plainly:
• The nations will tremble
• The powers of heaven will be shaken
• Men will die of fear
• The Son of Man will appear
Modern theology often softens these words.
The traditional Catholic receives them as truth
because they came from the mouth of God.
This is Advent:
not only preparing for Bethlehem,
but preparing for Judgment.

2. “Lift up your heads, for your redemption is at hand.”
While the world collapses,
the Christian stands upright.
The Gospel does not end in fear it ends in hope.
The faithful who live the Gospel, who obey the commandments, who persevere through trial,
who remain faithful to Tradition, will not tremble when Christ comes:
They will rejoice.

3. “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My words shall not pass away.”
This line is a fiery rebuke to the modern world.
Everything fades.
Everything decays.
Everything ends.
But Christ’s doctrine does not change.
His moral law does not change.
His sacraments do not change.
His Church does not change in her essence.
His promise does not change.
This is why the traditional Catholic clings to the ancient faith:
because Truth does not evolve.
Advent calls us to anchor our souls to what cannot be shaken.

SEGMENT 3: FEAST OF ST. SABAS

The Desert Father Who Built a City of God
St. Sabas (439–532), one of the greatest monks of the early Church, founded the famous Mar Saba Monastery in the Judean desert, a place of silence, prayer, fasting, and holiness for over 1,500 years.

He lived through:
• heresies attacking Christ’s divinity
• political pressure on the Church
• internal corruption
• societal decay

And yet, like Paul in the Epistle
and like the faithful in the Gospel,
he remained steadfast.

What St. Sabas teaches us today

1. Silence is the language of Advent.
Sabas sought solitude not to escape the world,
but to prepare for God.
Advent invites us to interior silence:
• fewer distractions
• less noise
• more prayer
• more contemplation
• more room for Christ

2. Penance prepares the soul for Christ.
Sabas fasted constantly.
He slept little.
He labored, prayed, and suffered for Christ.
The world tells us to indulge.
Advent tells us to fast.
The world tells us to celebrate.
Advent says: prepare.
The world tells us to be comfortable.
Advent says: be purified.

3. Fidelity saves the Church.
Sabas defended orthodoxy
against emperors, bishops, and heretics
who tried to distort doctrine.
He risked exile, rejection, and persecution
to defend the truth.
This is the model for Catholics today:
resist error, cling to Tradition, embrace suffering, guard the Faith.

SEGMENT 4 — LIVING THIS MESSAGE TODAY
Advent is the season to become like St. Sabas.
1. Wake up spiritually.
No more delaying conversion.
No more excuses.
No more spiritual sleep.
2. Reject the works of darkness.
Identify the sins, habits, and attachments
that keep you spiritually numb.
Cast them off.
3. Live with holy expectation.
Christ is coming—
in grace,
in the Eucharist,
at death,
and at the end of time.
Be ready.
4. Pursue silence and penance.
Turn off the world.
Pick up the Rosary.
Return to confession.
Seek holiness.

CONCLUSIONARY PRAYER
Let us pray.
O Jesus, Light of the world,
Who callest us in this holy season
to awaken from sin
and prepare our souls for Thy coming,
grant us the grace to live in watchfulness,
penance, purity, and holy desire.
Through the intercession of St. Sabas,
teach us the love of silence,
the courage to reject the world,
the strength to persevere in trial,
and the wisdom to seek only Thee.
May Thy words guide us,
Thy grace sustain us,
and Thy coming purify us.
Come, Lord Jesus.
Amen.