One day not very long ago, I went to meet some friends who I hadn’t seen for quite some time for lunch. And once our meal came to the table, I suggested to them that I would offer a little prayer of grace before we ate. And they looked at me, one of them said, “Right here, now?” I said, “Yeah. Why not? I’m grateful. Aren’t we all grateful for our lives and for the food that we’re about to eat? Why not let God know? I’m not shy about doing that.” And so they reluctantly bowed their heads and I said a little prayer of blessing before we shared in the meal.

Today we hear about John the Baptist. He was not shy at all about proclaiming his message of repentance, for the Kingdom of God was near. The Kingdom of God was at hand. What about us? A lot of times, we’re shy about sharing our faith in Jesus, our faith in God. We’re shy about proclaiming who we are and how we live as Catholics. John has a very beautiful and challenging message for all of us on the Second Sunday of Advent. He reminds us that each of us are like him, a voice that’s crying out in the wilderness, a voice that’s crying out in the wilderness.

And what is that voice saying? What message are we giving to the world? And how we live and what we say and do, are we proclaiming God or are we pushing others away? Are we letting our lives be examples of someone who out of faith lives more deeply in love and compassion and kindness and mercy because of who we are as Christian people? Do we live in a way that brings hope to others, or do we feed into negativism and despair?

Today, John the Baptist reminds us we are all like him in the sense that we are voices crying out in the wilderness, and what we say and do and how we live our lives. What is the message that we’re putting out there? Hopefully, like John, it’s a message that we heard as in today’s Gospel. The Kingdom of God is here, the Kingdom of God is now, the Kingdom of God is living in us.