It's (Not Yet) Beginning to Feel a Lot Like Christmas

If you're having trouble getting into the Christmas spirit, if it does not yet feel as though Christmas is nearly upon us, fret not! It isn't. The four weeks of waiting for Christmas, liturgically marked with the season of Advent, remind us that Christmas is not yet. Minister and theologian Fred Craddock writes, "Everybody is already having Christmas except the church." And this is true. Red and green decor adorns city streets; stores pump out Christmas music and promote holiday deals that end December twenty-fourth; Santa Clause has come to the mall. I myself have already watched two Christmas films, imbibed grotesque amounts of eggnog, participated in two gift exchanges, and parted ways with many a person with the phrase, "Merry Christmas." But I find myself saying it to people I do not think I will see again before Christmas. It is a wish for the future; not the present. Merry Christmas to you, when it happens in a week or so. Merry Christmas to your not yet celebration of joy and love with family and friends. Merry Christmas to the season that is nigh. Christmas is close, I can smell it. I can hear Christmas echo from this coming Saturday, I can feel the anticipation in my heart and chest. Christmas is coming coming coming, but not yet. First we must wait. First we must crave Christmas.

RESOURCES:

"Sunday, December 26, 2010" by Fred Craddock, The Christian Century (Dec. 14 2010)

To Understand Myself

I want, by understanding myself,
to understand others.
I want to be all that I am capable of becoming....
This all sounds very strenuous and serious.
But now that I have wrestled with it,
it's no longer so.
I feel happy--deep down.
All is well.

RESOURCE:

"To Understand Myself " by Katherine Mansfield, The Heart Has Its Seasons: Reflections on the Human Condition edited by Louis Savary and Thomas O'Connor (Regina Press: 1970)

Big Breath! Advent, Week Two

My friend asked me what Advent is, he being a religion-less heathen. As if simply being a non-Christian weren't treacherous enough. Seriously though, his question brought me pause, as Advent also calls me to halt in the silence that is the inhale before the eruption of heralding angel voices singing, "Glory to the newborn King!" Oh Advent. Oh waiting. Oh patience, anticipation, anxiety attacks. Well, that last one isn't exactly part of the proper Advent season celebrated by Christians as we prepare for the birth of Christ on Christmas. But it was part of my second week of Advent. It's probably nothing, but as the days plunge into further darkness I find myself suffering from mysterious angst.

Last Sunday marked the second week of Advent, when we Catholics get to light two candles around the Advent wreath, the light and Christmas excitement building as we tumble towards December twenty-fifth. The day began as smooth and lazy as any Sunday might, but was pocked around one o'clock when my chest tightened, my pulse quickened, and the room with its walls and ceiling left me claustrophobic and panicked. Like any person enduring a panic attack might do, I began huffing exaggeratedly loud and helplessly waved my wrists as my tears started. Pathetic.

The freak moment passed and I shamelessly crawled into my bed for the rest of the afternoon thinking, "Am I really a crazy person?" Verdict? Yes, I totally am. But not because I have anxiety issues or food intolerances or even because I share way too much personal information on my insignificant blog that I make my friends and family read. No, that's not my crazy, that's just me. My crazy is that I remain a Roman Catholic--devout and practicing, more or less--despite all the guilt and daddy issues and anger this belief ignites in me. (More on all that at some later date). Being Catholic is part of my crazy. And so then is observing the season of Advent.

Advent marks a specific space in Christian consciousness during which we anticipate Jesus' birth. The ever-risen Christ is, during this hushed time of waiting, not yet born to the world. Advent serves to remind us believers that God's kingdom is always here and not here; always now and not yet. As Fr. Richard Rohr phrases it, adult Christianity is about "making your entire life, and the life of the church, one huge advent." Being human is about always becoming human. To my Catholic mind, Advent is the deep inbreath of solace before the joyous exaltation that hope is born, today and always.

RESOURCES:

Richard Rohr, Preparing for Christmas (Cincinnati, OH: St. Anthony Messenger Press, 2008)

Light the Advent candle one ...

... now the waiting has begun ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VW15vdcNSSk