In these last days of Advent we sing the "O" antiphons at Vespers with great solemnity: candles, incense, church bells, a special book from which to sing . . . all intended to focus mind and heart on the significance of the words. Colophon commented on the antiphons in 2007 and on our liturgy page you will find texts, music, and recordings (fear not, sung by others!) with some suggestions for scripture to ponder.

So it is with a cheerful conscience that we turn to the Mass readings for inspiration. Today we have Genesis 49. 2, 8-10 and Matthew 1. 1-17, together with Ps 71 and a curiously abridged version of O Sapientia as the Gospel Acclamation. The opening prayer of the Mass, with its breath-taking "may we share in the divinity of Christ, who humbled himself to share in our humanity", will still be ringing in our ears when we hear the gospel. Some people find the Old Testament genealogies tiresome. Even the genealogy of Christ is sometimes read as though it were meaningless. But today we shall be reminded forcefully that God became man in Jesus Christ, that he came of an ordinary human family, and like all of us, had a few skeletons in his family cupboard. Look at some of the names in Matthew's list and you will see what I mean: alongside the great and good are the decently obscure and a few instances of what we might most kindly call folly.

We begin, of course, with Abraham, our father in faith, and go on through the patriarchs, some a little dodgy it is true, but made respectable by their antiquity; but what about Rahab? A prostitute is not the kind of ancestor most people glory in, unless she happens to be the paramour of kings. And Ruth, why, she wasn't even Jewish. David may have been the great hero of Judaism, the kind of king Israel hoped to find in the Messiah, but his son Solomon was born of adultery with Bathsheba. Only when we come to "Joseph the husband of Mary; of her was born Jesus who is called the Christ" does this long list of begetting reach its end. With Christ we come to the perfect fulfilment of creation, of everything the Divine Wisdom brought into being; and it is Christ whom we shall invoke tonight under the title of Wisdom and ask to come and teach us the way of prudence.