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Second Sunday of Advent | "Amahl and the Night Visitors"



Last Sunday, we thought about the mystery of Advent through a ballet. This Sunday, we're being accompanied not by a ballet, but by an opera. Gian Carlo Menotti's opera, “Amahl and the Night Visitors”, tells the story of a poor boy with a leg disability and his mother who are visited by the three wise men as they travel to Bethlehem.

This beautiful story brings us face to face with the drama of extreme poverty as it confronts wealth: the drama of a mother who, weakened by poverty, steals the gift of the Magi. This theft sets the stage for forgiveness and reconciliation and is the motto for the final scene, which will be hidden from the reader of this article for the time being.

This opera shows us how the contrasts between poverty and wealth are not incompatible, quite the opposite. Illuminated by the mystery of compassion and forgiveness, they can be so compatible that they become a true translation of the mystery of redemption, as when we look at this Sunday's first reading: “The wolf will live with the lamb and the panther will sleep with the kid; the calf and the young lion will walk together and a child will lead them. The calf and the bear will graze together, their young will sleep side by side; and the lion will eat hay like the ox”. Is 11:6-9.

How can we reconcile the contrasts in our lives so that they are a translation of the mystery of redemption? This is the question that can remain as the backdrop for an inner transformation driven by the Holy Spirit. This is the transformation that we hope for in the Advent season: to make our contrasts and weaknesses moments of inner conversion.

The opera ends with the gesture of the poor boy offering his crutch to the Magi so that they can take it as a gift to Jesus. Amahl sees in the Magi's gift the possibility of making an offering and gives them his crutch, offering Jesus his securities so that he can finally be cured of his illnesses.

Perhaps this is the secret of healing, offering all our securities so that, in the space of our poverty, the mystery of redemption can be made possible. What if the secret of Christmas is poverty? Poverty of spirit opens us up to the Kingdom of Heaven, as the Beatitudes tell us. In fact, only a poor person can truly point the way to true wealth. This Advent, as we prepare the way of the Lord, as John the Baptist asks us in today's Gospel, let us not accumulate, let us not save, but let us offer everything! Because Jesus will be born in this nothingness that will emerge from our offering!

Sr. Sophie Alves, asm


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