O Antiphon Dec 17, "O Wisdom, you come forth from the mouth of the Most High and, reaching from beginning to end, you ordered all things mightily and sweetly. Come, and teach us the way of prudence."
Today as we turn the corner and head down the straight road toward Christmas, just 9 days away, we encounter the genealogy of Jesus.
This genealogy shows us that Jesus was a man woven into human history with its ups and downs. He is the fruit of a lengthy past filled with many blemishes and marks; this path has many skeletons hanging in the closet, a checkered past filled with incest, adultery, murder, dishonesty, prostitution, and yet in the midst of the many detours around goodness, God keeps his promise.
God is relentless; he writes straight with crooked lines; he leads the blind on paths they know not.
And if we look closely we discover that the real hinges of the genealogy are not the deeds of men but the faith of women, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, Tamar. These women of pagan and gentile origin direct the lineage to be one of faith and grace. In Mary, at the final decisive point, we see the complete realization of the whole history of men.
Through Mary a new beginning is made; a new beginning comes through faith. The faith of mothers changes and redirects everything to God: the path of grace come through the women.
Something to think about.
Despite all the wrong turns, the path of fidelity opens wide for Christ. In the history of "no" spoken to God there is one "yes" that changes everything, that rights every wrong.
"Of her is born Jesus who is called the Christ."
Thus, the genealogy is a genealogy of grace that welcomes the sinners and is based on forgiveness, and the darkness gives way to the light.
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