by Fr. Tommy Lane
It was an extraordinary sight—the whole of Judea and Jerusalem making their way to John the Baptist asking for baptism, as Mark tells us (Mark 1:5). Something like this had never before happened. The Jewish people were not baptized as babies. Instead, baptism was undergone by converts to Judaism. But now the Jewish people themselves were going to John for baptism. What was going on? It meant a major change coming, as if they were all changing to a new religion, just like the converts to them being baptized. There was in fact a major change coming: Jesus. Their hopes and dreams of a Messiah would be fulfilled in Jesus, though in a way far different to what they had expected.
Rabbi Israel Zolli became chief rabbi of Rome in 1940. In 1945 after Italy was liberated by the Allied Forces of World War II, he and his wife were baptized and received into the Catholic Church in a basilica in Rome, and he took the name Eugenio at his baptism. This meant he lost everything and had to search for work. It was not a sudden conversion; he was twenty years on this road to conversion. He had been Catholic in his heart for a long time and had been reading the New Testament since his youth. Seven years prior to his baptism, he wrote a book entitled The Nazarene examining the relationship between Jewish writings and the New Testament. A Roman archbishop said he could have signed the book himself. Zolli describes how one evening,
without knowing why, I placed my pen on the table and, as though in an ecstasy, I invoked the name of Jesus . . . I found no peace until I beheld him in a large unframed picture in a dark corner of the room. I contemplated him for a long while, without agitation, experiencing rather a perfect serenity of mind.…I said to myself: ‘Was not Jesus a Son of my people? Was not he spirit of the same spirit?’ (L. Hanley Duquin A Century of Catholic Converts p137)
Israel Zolli, who became Eugenio Zolli, was fortunate in that he found Jesus as the answer to his search for meaning. Zolli’s conversion to Catholicism and seeing his Jewish faith fulfilled in Jesus was his way of preparing the way of the Lord and making straight the paths of his life. Many are searching today and don’t know Jesus is the answer. God created our soul, and our soul will not be happy until it is fulfilled in God. The world is in a state of unrest and volatility as we all know. The world needs Jesus—needs more of Jesus so that it will find rest. Unfortunately, the world seems to be pushing Jesus away more and more even though Jesus is the answer to the unrest and volatility of the world. The more the world pushes Jesus away, the more unsettled and volatile it will be.
We are all here because we have found Jesus as the answer. Yet we all have in our lives metaphorical highways to straighten and valleys to fill. Advent is a great time for this in preparation for Christmas. Just as all the Judeans went to John the Baptist for a baptism of repentance, we can make use of the Sacrament of Reconciliation in preparation for Christmas. Then we will be fulfilling in our lives the words of our Scriptures today:
Prepare the way of the
Lord,
make straight his paths. (Mark 1:3; Isa 40:3-4)
© Fr. Tommy Lane 2023
This homily was delivered in a parish in Ireland.
More Homilies for the Second Sunday of Advent Year B
O come, O come Emmanuel and ransom captive Israel 2020
Longing for God 2017
Prepare the way of the Lord: Christ will come again 2008
Related Homilies: Making room for Jesus in our hearts during Advent 2015
God is offering you a grace this Advent
Advent: preparing our hearts for the the Second Coming of Jesus