Celebrating Advent in a Culture of Fear

This comes from one of my favorite writers, Mark Shea:


In the spirit of Benedict XVI, I would like to recommend a penitential psalm as grist for meditation for Christians living in a time of fear manipulation. Plato says somewhere that if a people will not have justice as king in their city, then they shall have pleasure and pain whether they will or no. This is what our culture has opted for and our ruling classes, ever keenly alive to what it takes to seize and maintain power, are acutely aware of it. That's why we're ruled by people whose preferred method is to find something that scares the crap out of us and then menace us with it while presenting themselves as saviors from it. A people with no historical memory, swayed by the demands of stomach and groin and petrified of losing their comforts and toys is a people who are perfect prey for this form of governance and the only way to escape that fate is to become another kind of people.

Psalm 32 is a penitential psalm that calls us, among other things, to rise above our mere animal natures, stop behaving like beasts who have to be curbed with the bit and bridle of fear and material luxury and think and act like human beings again. It strikes me as peculiarly appropriate in this season of Advent that winds up the Decade of Fear:

Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven,
whose sin is covered.
Blessed is the man to whom the LORD imputes no iniquity,
and in whose spirit there is no deceit.
When I declared not my sin,
my body wasted away through my groaning all day long.
For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me;
my strength was dried up* as by the heat of summer. [Selah]
I acknowledged my sin to thee,
and I did not hide my iniquity; I said,
"I will confess my transgressions to the LORD";
then thou didst forgive the guilt of my sin. [Selah]
Therefore let every one who is godly offer prayer to thee;
at a time of distress, * in the rush of great waters,
they shall not reach him.
Thou art a hiding place for me,
thou preservest me from trouble;
thou dost encompass me with deliverance. * [Selah]
I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go;
I will counsel you with my eye upon you.
Be not like a horse or a mule,
without understanding,
which must be curbed with bit and bridle,
else it will not keep with you.
Many are the pangs of the wicked;
but steadfast love surrounds him who trusts in the LORD.
Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice,
O righteous, and shout for joy,
all you upright in heart!

Penitential psalms are God's way of saying there is hope for us. We don't have to be slave to the culture of fear. We can know the freedom of the children of God. Let's take him at his word!