"The Opportunity of Conversion" - Sermon for Advent 2, 12-7-25

There is a joyful sort of universalism in today’s readings; a sign of how much God loves us. Jesse’s root – the coming Christ – will be the signal to peoples of the nations who seek him. The fulfillment of the first coming of Christ will bring the Gentiles into the fold. And even the stones in the riverbed of the Jordan will be born as beloved children, if God desires it. This was gospel then; this is good news now.

But there’s a catch, or an opportunity, if you prefer. Repentance. Confession. Conversion. To shed the viperous skin of Eden’s tempter that we put on, so we can reconnect to the tree of life – the wood of the cross, perhaps? – that our first ancestors left behind.

John the Baptist does not mince words. “You brood of vipers!” he says to the Pharisees and the Sadducees coming to take part in John’s baptism of repentance, confession, and conversion.

The evangelist Matthew does a bit of foreshadowing here. The Pharisees and the Sadducees will soon become Jesus’s nemeses, his opponents. We can think of the Pharisees and the Sadducees as two opposing parties within a larger political and religious system. The Pharisees were, broadly speaking, representative of the more common people of Jerusalem and Judea. The Sadducees were members of a higher social class. The Pharisees had little use for the occupying Romans. The Sadducees maintained their relative wealth and position by tolerating the Romans, and collaborating with them outright when it suited their interests.

John hasn’t anything good to say about either the Pharisees or the Sadducees. He does not sound optimistic about their readiness to repent, confess, and convert. Maybe he thinks that they are in it for the show. Soon, Jesus will call them wrong-headed hypocrites.

It is risky, isn’t it – wearing one’s religious identity on one’s sleeve. Then and now. It is easy to get called out.

I wonder what John would say to partisans and pundits today – our own Pharisees and Sadducees – who trumpet their faith by wearing crosses around their necks or pinned to their lapels. Can one wear the cross, which signifies the claim to have repented, confessed, and converted to the way of Jesus, while promoting policies that starve the poor; that detain and deport the immigrant; that bomb the small-boated seafarer to a watery grave?

What about those who make a public show of going to Sunday Mass? Can one receive the Body and Blood of Jesus, while promoting policies that enrich the wealthy and themselves; that increase war budgets administration after administration; that support and sustain regimes that do our dirty work for us?

One can, apparently. And many do. What would John say? And Jesus?

The peaceable kingdom that Isaiah envisions is still far off, even though it is God’s dream for us. The prosperous mountains and righteous little hills that the Psalmist prays for have yet to arise, even though they are God’s hope for us. The divine harmony that Saint Paul begs for remains discord because of those who listen to and parrot the viperous voices that divide us.

There is a catch to following Jesus, isn’t there? Or, better yet, an opportunity. What do you hear in John’s invitation to repent, confess, and convert that convinces and convicts you to work to change one thing about yourself – even one thing! – to enflesh and inspire your Christian duty to promote God’s peace, God’s prosperity, and God’s harmony?

God desires you to be fruitful trees and finest wheat. God’s grace comes down like the showers that water the earth. God gives you the means to grow. Ask for it. Accept it. Don’t wear your faith on your sleeve. Let it soak into your blood and into your bones. And wait and see what happens. You will become God’s good news. You will become gospel for the nations. You will bear fruit worthy of repentance.

Father Daniel S.J. Scheid, SCP

2^nd Sunday of Advent – December 7, 2025

All Saints’ Episcopal Church, San Francisco

“The Opportunity in Conversion”