Sadly, the season of Advent is often bookended by two poignant scenes: the long lines of holiday shopping on “Black Friday” and scattered trees on the sidewalks by the evening of Dec. 26. Although the Church invites us to joyful expectation during Advent, that joy is often replaced by frenzied preparations that seem to end as abruptly as they began.
Growing up, one of my most cherished memories of preparing for the coming of Christ was the appearance of a small wooden manger in our kitchen. Next to it, my mother had cut yellow and brown yarn into three-inch-long strips. Each time we completed a chore or performed a generous act of service, we were allowed to place a piece of yarn in the manger. The week before Christmas, my parents would balefully look at the manger and say, “It sure looks like a hard bed for Baby Jesus.” We would do our best to fill that bed for the small, ceramic figurine that would be placed in the manger on Christmas Day!
Emphasize expectation this Advent
Often, we think that unless our Advent preparations are as full and frenetic as our preparations of gifts, trees, ornaments and cards, we are somehow not doing enough. But perhaps there is a deeper invitation here into the liturgical rhythm of the Church. Advent is a season of preparation, and we need not have everything ready by Christmas Day. Christmas is celebrated as an octave in the Church, an eight-day period from Christmas Day until the Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God. As Catholics, we are invited to treat each of those days with the same reverence and joy as we might the Nativity of Our Lord!
To that end, perhaps we might work to emphasize the sense of expectation for Jesus this year. Rather than fill our days only with decoration and gift-wrapping, these could become days of quiet reflection and prayer. Shopping and other tasks will need to be completed, but we should not lose sight of the importance of stillness and prayer. Something as simple as following an Advent calendar or daily Scripture readings can go a long way in grounding our sense of expectation. And when Christmas Day does arrive, we can use the full eight-day octave of celebration to finish putting up our decorations, each day remembering that the cause of our joy has arrived: Christ has been born!
