Advent Prophet

In Advent, Christians hear the voice of this prophet:From Luke 3, The Message:

When crowds of people came out for baptism because it was the popular thing to do, John exploded: "Brood of snakes! What do you think you're doing slithering down here to the river? Do you think a little water on your snakeskins is going to deflect God's judgment? It's your life that must change, not your skin. And don't think you can pull rank by claiming Abraham as 'father.' Being a child of Abraham is neither here nor there—children of Abraham are a dime a dozen. God can make children from stones if he wants. What counts is your life. Is it green and blossoming? Because if it's deadwood, it goes on the fire."

The crowd asked him, "Then what are we supposed to do?"

"If you have two coats, give one away," he said. "Do the same with your food."

Tax men also came to be baptized and said, "Teacher, what should we do?"

He told them, "No more extortion—collect only what is required by law."

Soldiers asked him, "And what should we do?"

He told them, "No shakedowns, no blackmail—and be content with your rations."

No camel hair pelt... no locusts, but I was moved when I heard that exact same message echoing from an empty Senate chamber, coming from the mouth of another... well... prophet:

"I would hope that for these people who are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, they will look around them and say, 'There is something more important in life than the richest people becoming richer when we have the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world.' Maybe they will understand that they are Americans, part of a great nation which is in trouble today. Maybe they've got to go back to the Bible or whatever they believe in understanding that there is virtue in sharing, in reaching out, that you can't get it all.

How can anybody be proud to say that I am an multimillionaire and I've been getting a huge tax break and one-quarter of the kids in this country is on food stamps?"

(excerpt from Sen. Bernie Sanders' 8-hour speech on the floor of the Senate, December 9th, 2010... camel hair pelt and locusts excluded)