Dear friends,
This year, Advent season, the season of waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ begins in late November. In this season, we are encouraged to prepare our heart and mind so that we will be ready when He comes. Of course, Advent is a time of preparation that leads us to the joy of the Christmas celebration, which commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ. However, the true spirit of Advent is not just about waiting for something that has already happened over 2,000 years ago. Rather, during this time, the Church encourages us to prepare ourselves for the coming of Jesus Christ that will take place in the future. That is the coming that signals the end of the present world and the beginning of the new world, the Kingdom of God. It is also the coming that signals the end of each of our life, calling us into judgment before the Lord about the actions that we have taken in our life.
We are also called to prepare ourselves to wait for the coming of the Lord into all the moments of our life, in our relationship with family, friends, neighbors and strangers. The Lord comes to us in the form of the wife who longs for a loving embrace from her husband. The Lord comes to us in the form of the woman who sells flower leis at the traffic intersection. The Lord comes to us in the form of people standing at the rooftops to escape the water rising in their homes. The Lord comes to us in the form of people living on the streets and in temporary shelters because their homes have been destroyed by storms and other natural disasters. And the Lord comes to us in the form of our brothers and sisters who are suffering from various emotional and physical health problems.
This year, World AIDS Day falls during our Advent season. In our Church community, people who are living with HIV/AIDS are no strangers to us. They are our children, our friends, our colleagues, and our brothers and sisters in Christ. I am so thankful to God that in our community, there is wonderful acceptance of our brothers and sisters who are living with the HIV virus. In fact, I can even say that HIV is not an issue for us because we live and work together as brothers and sisters in Christ, and not based on the status of blood tests.
Unfortunately, the love and accpetance in our community is not always visible in other parts of the society and the world, where people infected with HIV still suffer from tremendous discrimination and mistreatment. Thirty years into the pandemic, UNAIDS estimates that 33.3 million people globally are living with HIV. This number includes an estimated 2.5 million children under the age of 15 years. About 10 million people are not receiving the medication they need to sustain their health.
As we journey through the Advent Season and celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, let us again remember that Christ has already come. He will come again on the last day. And He is coming to us everyday, in the faces of our brothers and sisters, especially those who are suffering and marginalized. Let us be ready to welcome Him.
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