Dear Parishioners:
Christmas music now begins after Halloween!
I hope you had a Happy Thanksgiving celebration. Mine was excellent as I visited my sister and her family in Saratoga, New York. The meal was outstanding, the company terrific, and the football fantastic. Thanks be to God for the blessing and bounty we enjoy.
On the drive home to Rhode Island, the radio played nothing but Christmas music. I like Christmas music as much as anybody, but we are just starting Advent! It calls us to wait for Christmas and consider how well we await Christ’s coming.
Practically and spiritually speaking, Advent is a season of waiting. As we enter the hustle and bustle of the holidays, we eagerly count down the days to Christmas. Those days are usually filled with shopping, cooking, partying, and planning — all in preparation for the impending celebration.
There are two ways we can approach this period of preparation, which could also be called a period of joyful anticipation. One is with excitement and eagerness — excitement for the family to come into town, excitement to see the kids’ faces on Christmas morning, and the excitement of the season in general. The other is one of dread and trepidation. Dread about all the cooking and chores that need to be done, dread about hosting in-laws, and an overall sense of wanting the season to be over before it’s even started.
The Journey To Bethlehem by Adolf Joseph Weidlichh, 1865
Spiritually, we can also encounter these same feelings. We constantly pray and present our petitions to the Lord, waiting for him to answer. Sometimes, we’re excited about what he has in store for us. Sometimes, we’re not. It’s that period of waiting in anticipation for him that can, at times, be the most excruciating.
Praying and lighting the Advent Wreath at home with family.
St. Augustine says about this waiting period: “If God seems slow in responding. It is because He is preparing a better gift. He will not deny us. God withholds what you are not yet ready for. He wants you to have a lively desire for His greatest gifts. That is to say, pray always and do not lose heart.”
There are lessons to be learned from St. Augustine. The first is that waiting is not something to be dreaded. In this age of instant gratification, where we can answer emails on our smartphones and have literally anything shipped to our front door in days, waiting has become an annoyance and an inconvenience for many people.
What has been lost is that waiting is a form of suffering. As Christians, we are called to unite our sufferings to Christ, no matter how minuscule that suffering may seem. Waiting in your car in holiday shopping traffic? Don’t pull out your phone. Instead, bask in the moment, turn on music, pray the Rosary, and thank God for another day.
The second lesson is that we are not in control; God is! Why do we teach children the concept of patience? Despite all our efforts to eradicate it, we know that waiting is an inherent and necessary part of life. God does not deny us, nor does he let us down. He wants us to desire his gifts, and sometimes, in order for that desire to come to fruition, it means having to wait. Waiting may be hard sometimes, but with prayer and patience, we better appreciate and rejoice in fulfilling those desires.
The Pre-Christmas hustle and bustle of shopping for gifts.
When we wait and prepare during Advent, we need to make intentional acts of prayer and devotion such as the Rosary, Mass, Confession, spiritual reading, and reflection on the Scriptures of the season.
We should make conscious efforts to slow down, all while actively anticipating the coming of Christ. It balances a spiritual sense of joyful anticipation and expectant waiting with the “busyness” of shopping, baking, and cleaning. This helps open our hearts to the true meaning of Christmas.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux, in an Advent Sermon, suggests: “We should celebrate this season of Advent with all possible devotion, rejoicing in so great a consolation, inflamed with love by so great a manifestation of charity, But let us not think of that Advent only whereby the Son of man has ‘come to seek and to save that which was lost,’ but also of that other by which He will come again and take us to Himself. Keep these two Advents in your meditation, pondering in your hearts how much we have received by the first, how much we are promised at the second!”
Be well. Do good. God Bless. A Blessed Advent!