Thomas Griffin 6/24/24
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“Wake up.”
This was one of the phrases that summarized my life as a teenager. I cannot remember a day that went by that my mom did not have to call upstairs and wake up my twin brother for school (and pretty much any other function that happened in the morning). We didn’t want to get out of bed, because like most teenagers, nothing in life excited us enough. We were living mostly for ourselves and what we wanted to do.
While there is a normalcy in the above lines for the average American teenager, there is also something deeply connected between my need to be woken up each morning and the role of the man we remember today: John the Baptist. Particularly we celebrate his nativity, his birth into the world. The birth story that we are familiar with from Luke’s Gospel reveals that John’s birth was all about preparation and repentance.
John came to wake everyone up. He entered the world, opened his eyes and made it his life’s mission to proclaim repentance – the waking up of one’s soul and entire life to God.
I once read a description of the early church by Pope Benedict XVI. He noted how many people know that the earliest Christiand were known as followers of The Way. However, Christnans were also referred to as “the living ones.” This title came from the fact that they were the only ones in the culture who were fully alive. Someone had risen them from their slumber. They were no longer sleepwalking through life – they lived with an intentional and unwavering purpose.
In honor of John the Baptist, it is critical that we ask ourselves: in what ways do we need to wake up? If the Christian life is an endless and everlasting relationship then there is always room for growth. If we investigate the areas of American culture that are most broken we can find the recipe to relying more on Christ and becoming more open to accepting the invitation of John the Baptist.
I would propose that there are two avenues that are most important for our culture to “wake up” from. First, we need to regain a vision for our purpose. John the Baptist knew who he was and what to do with his life because he relied on his relationship with God. Faith was the most important thing to his parents, so it became the most important thing to John. We must wake up the culture to see that without God, we are lost.
We don’t have to simply claim this as an opinion. Our times can benefit from studies showing this to be fact. According to Lifeway Research nearly 70% of Americans ask themselves if life could have more meaning and purpose on a regular basis. Mental Health America has reported that 46% of Americans will meet the criteria for a diagnosable mental health condition sometime in their life.
These stats scream for us to cling to God and to repent of any idols, as John the Baptist preached. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2), he constantly declared. Jesus Christ has come and he is in our midst. To find our purpose and meaning in life all we have to do is gaze at the cross and view our worth – you are worth God’s life and our purpose is to love like he did.
Secondly, John the Baptist would most likely desire to wake us up from our screens. On average, Americans spend about 4 and a half hours per day on their phones. This does not include the screen time on their computers at work. A Stanford University study showed that Americans, on average, receive their first cell phone when they are 12 years old. “If the average life expectancy of an American is 76 years old that would mean the average American will spend 12 years staring at their phone screens over their lifespan.”
These rectangular black devices in our pockets can serve a good purpose, but they have become the center of our lives, and not just for young people. Rather than becoming consumed by our screens we are called to follow the Lamb of God, “who takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:29). About 40% of Americans desire to cut down on their screen time in 2024 but almost 25% believe they will fail in doing so. This shows the addictive nature of these devices. All sin shackles us, it controls us. To conquer what enslaves us we need conversion, metanoia.
This is what John came to proclaim. He was calling people to completely change their lives and even their manner of thinking to align with Christ. To wake up and get off our screens will require that we fill that time with something else. This summer makes that something else, God. Spend more time in prayer and spiritual reading rather than with your head down in your phone. Slowly, this will change us and make us more captivated by the One that John came to proclaim, but it requires that we wake up.
I can often still hear that voice of my mom calling for me to wake up as a boy. It is a reminder to me on many mornings, especially when my alarm goes off and I don’t want to wake up to pray before my kids are ready for the day. Like John the Baptist, those words are a reminder to act boldly and simply for Jesus Christ, because he is all that we need – he makes us fully awake and alive. Emphatically making him the center of our lives will carve us out to be like those first Christians who were called “the living ones.” It make us into a people of joy and faith that wakes up a generation like the Baptizer did.
Thomas Griffin is the chairperson of the religion department at a Catholic high school on Long Island where he lives with his wife and two sons. He has a masters degree in theology and is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Empty Tomb Project: The Magazine.
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