A straight line is the shortest distance between two points.  This concept even the ancient Greeks knew about.  If time wants to be saved, then going in a straight line is the shortest route to get to the destination.  However, in life it does not always happen that way.  It is simple enough, follow the straight path to eternity.  But it is easier said than done.   Many times, it has been said, “Learn from experience.”   And how many times, people do that? Parents get tired of telling their children (even grown ones) to listen and learn from experience.  However, many times in life many people take the longer route to get there, to heaven.   Instead of following straight the commandments of the Lord, they veer away with the bad decisions they make.   Their life is not a straight line, but more like a line with many curves. Many people go off course in a wrong direction, with wrong decisions, but then they come back for a little while to God, and then they are off course again.  Sometimes this process happens in one day.  Sometimes it happens more with the dynamic of life.  For a couple of years, a person may be good, but then there is a wrong turn with sin and the person is off again from the straight line of life.   Today’s reading is asking for all to make their ways straight, to avoid the crooked road.  To make a permanent decision to stay in course with God, and not to go off in a curve that leads to destruction.  Most of the time when a person goes off with this curvature of life, it is not abrupt.  As it mentions in the first reading, they are lead stray one foot a time.  One minor wrong decision at a time.  And soon, the curvature becomes more prominent.  Some people say, “I don’t know when this happen.” But reality is day by day, making the wrong decisions leads little by little away from God, away from this straight line.  The challenge is to get back on track during this advent season.   The Lord gives an opportunity to start living in a straight line toward eternity, by living a life of prayer (mentioned at the second reading).  It is time to get back to the straight line of living, by promoting peace and justice throughout the world, so the glory of God may shine.  It is time to return to the straight line of living by following the commandments and living a more moral life. One small action at a time can bring a person back or can lead a person astray from the path to eternity.   Let us be purposeful during advent, so if we are at a curvature of life, we can come back to God and fulfill the words of the John the Baptist and “make straight the paths” of the Lord.