Sunday, December 30, 2001

Read: Matthew 25:31-46

"Oh, my God!" We remember having heard this shouting cry over and over. I am writing this page of my reflection in the evening of September 11th, still knowing not what has exactly happened in our country. This day, September 11th, 2001, will go down the history as the Disaster Day of America. Four airplanes were hijacked by terrorists, three of them were forced to collide into the World Trade Center, Twin Towers in Manhattan, New York, which made the Twin Towers collapse to the ground, and the Pentagon, in Washington. So many lives were taken (I do not know how many at this point). Unexpected, unimaginable, and unforgivable! I haven't any suitable words. But much is being said of terrorism and war; the Attack on America has touched so many around the world.

When I began to write the first page of this Advent reflection, I put the ominous word "Doomsday" into my computer screen based upon my reading of Matthew 25. And only one week later, I have already witnessed the cruel reality of Disaster on earth in the magnitude of "Doomsday." Doomsday is the Day of Judgment, as it is related to Jesus' Second Coming. Why does Jesus have to come back to this terrible world where he was killed by the force of injustice on his first visit? I think because justice was not done. He showed his Love through the words and deeds of his life, confronting the injustice of the world with his body and blood.

Though the complexity of society has become much different from the one Jesus had to struggle with, the main feature of principalities and powers are now almost the same as before, or even worse: "the Least of These (Matthew 25:45)" are still the same, being alienated and oppressed and marginalized and killed. I do not believe in the mythological phenomenon of Jesus' Second Coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory, at the sound of trumpet, as is described in Matthew 24:29-31, but I do believe in the Doomsday if we do not heed to the meaning of Jesus' First Coming, the declaration of God's Sovereignty, for which we should repent to welcome the new age. Are we ready to welcome the New Year, 2002 today in a much more awakened way, after having seen the acts of terror on September 11th, 2001?

Sungsoo Hans Hahn

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