December 3, 2014 – Excerpted from Put Out Into the Deep, Bishop DiMarzio’s column in The Tablet.

My dear brothers and sisters in the Lord,

We have begun Advent which is basically a time of waiting. Time is really important to us. We live in time – the time of our birth to our death. The time of Advent in a certain sense telescopes our life from its beginning to end. It gives us the opportunity to look back and look forward. To wait, in time, for the birth of Jesus, the Son of God Who is the author of all time.

At this time, an important question is, how do we view time in our lives? Time is not something we really like to waste. We like to make the most of our time in this life, and every day we should use the time God gives us for good purpose. As we think about how we use time, however, we recognize that sometimes we let it slip through our fingers. We do not take advantage of every day and make the best use of it. It does not mean we have to be workaholics, never stopping to take a rest or use leisure properly, but it is an opportunity to analyze the time we have, for time does not belong to us alone.

Time belongs to God. He has given us the time in our lives to find its meaning. As Christians, we find the meaning of time in Jesus Christ whose birth we prepare to celebrate during Advent. He is the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end of time.

Read the full text of the Bishop’s column on The Tablet website.