1 December 2026 · Syro-Malabar Rite
Open in the Daily Word appAlso: Latin Rite · Syro-Malankara Rite · മലയാളം
“Because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.” Luke 1:20
Paul's call fits the beginning of the fast: “You know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near. Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armour of light… put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Zechariah asks for a sign: “How will I know that this is so?” Gabriel's answer is both a rebuke and a gift: he will be silent until the promise is fulfilled. His nine months of silence become a retreat. During this fast, a little silence, from screens, gossip and noise, can prepare us to speak praise at Christmas.
Theme: “Wake up, and be silent before the Word.”
Paul calls us to wake; Zechariah's doubt becomes a fruitful silence.
“See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple.” Malachi 3:1
“The angel replied, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news.”” Luke 1:19
Apply: Listen today for a message God may be sending.
“Can a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old?” Genesis 17:17
“Zechariah said to the angel, “How will I know that this is so? For I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years.”” Luke 1:18
Apply: Choose one daily silence during the fast.
“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.” Isaiah 9:2
“Because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.” Luke 1:20
Apply: Lay aside one “work of darkness” today.
Salvation is near; wake up.
Let silence prepare us for praise.
Take-home resolution: Keep a daily hour of silence during the 25 Days' Fast.
Dear brothers and sisters, today our Church begins the twenty-five-day fast before Christmas, the Nombu that our ancestors kept with great seriousness. In many Kerala homes this fast still means no meat, simpler meals, more prayer and more almsgiving. But why do we fast before a feast? Because a great feast needs a prepared heart.
St Paul gives us the reason: you know what time it is; now is the moment to wake from sleep; salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near (Romans 13:11–12). Christian life is a waking up. We can spend years half asleep: going through religious customs without noticing the Lord who comes.
Paul is very practical about what waking up means. Let us lay aside the works of darkness: not in drunkenness, not in quarrelling and jealousy. Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 13:13–14). The fast from food is meant to strengthen a deeper fast: from sin, from anger at home, from the bottle, from the phone that steals our evenings.
In the Gospel the angel Gabriel tells the old priest Zechariah that his long prayer has been heard: Elizabeth will bear a son. But Zechariah asks: how will I know this? I am old. And because he does not believe, he becomes unable to speak until the promise is fulfilled (Luke 1:18–20).
Zechariah's silence was a correction, but also a gift. For nine months he could not talk; he could only listen, watch and pray. When his son was born, his first words were not complaints but the great song of praise, the Benedictus. Silence prepared his heart to sing.
This Nombu, let us include some silence. Less noise, less screen, less gossip. More time in the church, more family prayer, more reading of the Gospel. Then, like Zechariah, we will have a song ready when Christmas comes.
Let us make three simple resolutions today: a fast from one food, a fast from one sin, and a daily act of charity. And let us ask Mary, who carried the Word in silence, to help us keep this fast with joy. Amen.
Children, the fast before Christmas is like waking up early to get ready for a big feast. Give up one small thing for Jesus this month!
Lord, wake me from sleep and clothe me with your light. Forgive my doubts, and let the silence of these days prepare my heart to sing your praise. Amen.
Both readings turn on one small Greek word, kairos, the appointed time. Paul tells the Romans, “you know what time it is”: the night is nearly over, so get up and dress for the day. Gabriel tells Zechariah that his words “will be fulfilled in their time”, and the old priest, who cannot yet believe it, must wait for that time in silence. One reading wakes us and the other quiets us, and a fast needs both.
Setting.
Paul wrote to the Christians of Rome, probably from Corinth around AD 57, before he had ever visited them. After eleven chapters on what God has done in Christ, chapters 12–15 turn to how believers are to live. Just before this passage he has said, “Pay to all what is due them” (13:7), speaking of taxes and honour. Today’s reading picks up that word: there is one debt that can never be paid off.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.” (13:8)
Paul lists the commandments about the neighbour (v. 9) and says they are summed up in Leviticus 19:18. Love does not cancel the commandments. A person who truly loves will not steal from a neighbour or betray him.
“Besides this, you know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep.” (13:11)
Paul speaks to baptised people. Believers too can sleep: not by rejecting the faith, but by living as if nothing were about to happen.
“the night is far gone, the day is near.” (13:12)
This is the language of the last hour before dawn. The Christian lives between Easter, when the light has already broken, and the Lord’s return, when it will be full day.
“Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.” (13:14)
“Flesh” in Paul does not mean the body as something bad. It means human life closed in on itself and turned away from God. “Make no provision” is practical: do not plan ahead for your own falls.
How the Church reads it.
These verses have a famous place in Christian history. St Augustine tells in his Confessions (8.12) how, in a garden in Milan, he heard a child’s voice saying “take and read”, opened Paul’s letters, and came upon Romans 13:13–14; at the end of the sentence, he says, the darkness of doubt went away. The Catechism reads vv. 8–10 as Paul’s summary of the commandments of love (CCC 2196).
Setting.
Zechariah is a priest serving in the Temple, chosen by lot to offer the incense, and Luke calls him and Elizabeth righteous (1:6). The angel has just told him that his prayer is heard and that Elizabeth will bear a son (1:13). These three verses are his reply and the angel’s answer. The scene is the first of the matching pair that opens Luke’s Gospel: here an old priest in the sanctuary, and soon a young woman in an unknown town (1:26–38).
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“How will I know that this is so? For I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years.” (1:18)
In the Greek Old Testament these are almost the words of Abraham: “how am I to know” (Genesis 15:8). Zechariah stands in a long line of people who found God’s promise too large. His difficulty is real, and his faults are those of a faithful man who has prayed for a long time and stopped expecting an answer.
“I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news.” (1:19)
Zechariah has just entered the holy place to stand before God in the name of the people. The angel answers that he stands before God always. Whoever is sent from there does not need further proof.
“But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.” (1:20)
Zechariah asked for a sign and receives one, though not one he would have chosen. The people are waiting outside (1:21–22), and he cannot speak to them. Yet the promise stands. His unbelief delays his voice but does not delay God’s work.
How the Church reads it.
The Church sees in John the Lord’s immediate precursor (CCC 523). St Augustine, preaching on John’s birth, contrasts John the voice with Christ the Word (in substance); the priest’s silence comes before the birth of the one who will be “a voice”. Christian readers have always set this scene beside the Annunciation: both Zechariah and Mary ask a question, and the angel’s different answers show that God reads what lies under the words.
Why was Zechariah punished for his question, when Mary also asked a question and was not?
The two questions sound alike but ask different things. Zechariah asks how he can be sure, and the angel himself names the problem: “you did not believe”. Mary does not ask for proof. She asks how it will happen, given that she is a virgin (1:34), and she ends by consenting (1:38). Zechariah’s silence is also more than a penalty. It is the sign he asked for, and it ends in praise when his son is named (1:64).
The Twenty-five Day Fast traditionally begins today. These readings show what such a fast is for. It is not hunger for its own sake. It is getting up before dawn, taking off what belongs to the night, and learning a little of Zechariah’s silence so that we may have something to sing at Christmas.