A Holy Advent in Anticipation of Our Divine Messiah

nativity

In much of the West, the winter winds have begun to draw in and lead us, often wistfully, down nostalgic roads of a sort of pre-Christmas ritual.  Aggressive consumption and its accompanying evils are perhaps one of the tritest dead-horses to beat each year, but in this particular year it would seem most tragic to allow the superficial, plastic season to slide by on a neon sleigh without considering the Catholic alternative.

We are all confronted with an embarrassing and nearly crippling array of choices for how we want to live each day. While the Church in her wisdom has definite tools for us to lean upon in these daily crossroads, the liturgical life and pattern of the Church is a deep and abiding help that allows us to pass through seasons and years with a Christologically significant perspective.

An Absent Observance

While Lent is all too often an abused version of itself in the lived experience of an observant Catholic, Advent in the United States has become the proverbial red-headed-stepchild of our culture.   It’s not even that we tend to do a poor job observing traditions or opportunities for spiritual rigor.  We generally do not observe the season at all!

Advent is of course a season that depends in every way upon the Feast of Christmas. We would have no Advent without the blissful joys of Christmas in the same sense that Lent does not exist without the thrill of Easter as its culmination.  That is why Advent is not simply a place holder which the Church slapped on the calendar because she didn’t feel comfortable having Christmas that close to Pentecost or the feast of the Ascension.

The Advent season is a time to take stock of our spiritual houses and to do the good work of preparing our hearts for the coming of the Christ Child. We do that simultaneously in our remembrance of that blessed moment in time, as well as in our anticipation of the return of Christ in glory at the end of time.

For some of us, this would necessarily mean a different set of practices than our normal spiritual routine. Regardless, this season is an opportunity to slow down and turn down both the inner and outer noise which so easily distracts us, and to cling again to the essentials of our beautiful faith.

Back to Essentials

Those essentials center on the grace of God in sending Christ, overlooked-yet-longed for, in the unassuming form of a small, helpless baby and entrusting Him to the care of a holy, simple young woman and her holy, simple husband.  While we should never cease to ponder the mind-bending awe of God’s Eternal Son emptying Himself into the very form of a servant and becoming a fragile child, we all, honestly, have a lot of things going on that make it difficult to contemplate these sacred realities. Global, local, and family-centered anxieties occupy most of our attention to varying degrees, and none of us is immune to the wars and rumors of wars which hang thick in the air about us.

Advent is important in many ways because it is the Church’s grand throat-clearing to remind us that for all the groaning and confused squabbling in which we partake, God has sent His solution to the agonies of a broken world.  In the Mass, as the highest and fullest form of prayer, we have the great Amen, but in Advent (and I say this reverently), it’s more like we find the great “Ahem”.

That is, we are slow to taste and see the goodness of the Lord in the waiting because we are short-sighted and find little joy in the passing of time. Modern people have long shuddered at the turning of the calendar, dreading otherwise random numerical milestones such as “30, 50, or 60” as if we might not just as easily die at 15 or 20.

Advent is a corporate return to center. It directs our hearts back to the dust of first century Palestine and reminds us of the lament of a people who clung to a promise and who did so for centuries despite the dimmest of hopes.  We marvel with Elizabeth and Zechariah that the barren have become pregnant, and we walk in reflection among the hills of Judea until, with the shepherds who saw and heard the angelic declaration, we rejoice that “unto us a child is born!”

A Patient Urgency

There is a patient urgency in the fabric of Advent.  I mean the marvelous, already-but-not-yet Christian reality which defines the nature of the Church in this last, unbelievable age from the Nativity until today.  We possess a joyful certainty in light of Christ’s coming that first Christmas, yet we gaze in our hearts towards the heavens as the Apostles did before us, no doubt daily, in a palpable longing for reunion with the King of Kings and the climax of all history.

Because we are so patently denied the richness of Advent by the neo-pagan world around us, we must work all the more tirelessly to carve out the space for it in our lives lest we get swept up in a commercial avalanche and bypass the depth and sublime glory of Christmas altogether. To keep a holy Advent, we must above all make an effort to slow down and listen.

Slow Down and Listen

While this is arguably laudable advice for all seasons of the year, making room for quiet in Advent is particularly important.  If Advent is an incredible chance to prepare our hearts for a time of intimate meditation on the gift of the Incarnation, slowing ourselves down and allowing room to grow and listen is the best way to get our hearts prepared for the encounter with Christ at Christmas.

There are myriad ways we can make Advent a time of deeper recollection, but rather than turning this into still another series of anxious tasks, let’s agree that simplicity is our friend.  One of the strongest and yet smallest steps we can take is to carve out time for silence.  For example, by turning the radio off on the commute (or letting natural background noise accompany exercise rather than digesting music and podcasts), we open ourselves to a deeper perception of the Lord’s voice.  Watching, waiting, and listening define the season, and anything we can do to make it easier for us to quiet our hearts will make it possible for us to live this out more deeply.

Liturgically, Advent is one of the richest and most aesthetically meaningful times of the year. The wealth of hymns and carols, up to the glorious “O Antiphons”, gives a distinctive flavor to the season, and this is something to bring into our homes. If you are in a parish that offers Rorate Masses on the Saturdays of Advent, consider adding them to your spiritual disciplines this year as well.  There is something majestic in rising early to unite with a community of faith in prayerful longing for the coming of our King.

A Word to the Wise

Lastly, a word of controversial advice. Since our culture ignores Advent altogether, it is little surprise that we are compelled to dive into the frenzy of commerce.  Rather than give you a firm date on when you are safe to start decorating for Christmas, my challenge is for you to be mindful of the way you decorate.

Growing up as an Evangelical Protestant, I didn’t have Advent. I spent many years with season-blurring early Christmas festivities, and while many of those things were cultural memories of Advent blurred into a vague sense of “Christmastime”, I can relate to the simple pleasure of being swept up into the general festive atmosphere.

You don’t sin by putting up a tree before Christmas Eve, but I want to encourage you to think of ways you can slowly build anticipation for the birth of Christ in your home. Sing Advent carols, add layers of decorations as the Sundays of Advent go by, and make time to visit and welcome friends and family.

Above all, pray. Advent is a season of gentle intensity, fueled by the dynamo of prayer.  Read the scriptures (the Gospels and the Prophets are particularly appropriate), pray your Rosary, and visit the Blessed Sacrament.  Whatever your state in life, know that God awaits us all this Advent. Meet Him in the silence and in the noise, and let the ancient song of Israel’s anticipation of the Divine Messiah arise fresh in your heart: “O Come, O Come Emmanuel.”

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2 thoughts on “A Holy Advent in Anticipation of Our Divine Messiah”

  1. Pingback: SVNDAY EDITION – Big Pulpit

  2. Luke 1: 41-45
    When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, “Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And how does this happen to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.”

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