Signposts of Advent

Yesterday, at the end of Mass the group was standing quietly awaiting the benediction and dismissal. During the announcements, Father mentioned that if people wanted to attend the earlier evening masses, they would need tickets , “And for Midnight Mass, well I was going to ask [evolver] here about that.”

I sort of stammered and gulped. Later, I was saying, “well I am kind of honoured, but...”

Our deepest tenor interrupted and said, “Honoured? No. They're desperate,” and grinned. We all laughed.

Still, I spent half the night up about it. My wife liked the idea, because that would give us the whole day on the 24th to concern ourselves with our daughter, who turns twenty, and my brother, whose birthday it is as well. Still, I had a certain anxiety about not being part of my own music group (doing the Midnight Mass would mean leaving my group for the night, who are doing 8:00 PM.)

I kind of feel badly that this came up. Our group leader was not happy about the idea of me not being part of the regular group (my lead guitar and alto descanting are part of the group's sound.) So I think I've kind of folded on the idea of doing Midnight Mass for the benefit of the group, though I really would have enjoyed the opportunity.

Yesterday was a big church day. I spent the afternoon working as part of a Cursillo group (mandolin this time), and then headed in the snow over to my regular group. The young seminarian who preached last night preached on the theme of imagination, in a way that touched upon my Nouwen musings of the other day – eerily so – about how we fill our lives with expectations in a way that takes away from the possibilities of imagination, the possibilities inherent in the unexpected.

In the second week of Advent, the theme - “He's coming” accelerates. We begin to see that he is coming, not just in the sense of observing history, but that he's coming again. History is always in motion – pointing towards the Messianic age in the sense that we expect the culmination of history, in one respect, yes. But our history is in motion on a personal level, too. Is it a motion towards God coming into our lives, or does a Christian adherent simply repeat the same pattern, Christmas after Christmas?

Nouwen almost pessimistically suggests that we vary between poles in life – never fully getting there, often backsliding back to near the start. In a sense he is right – I struggle with things I had hoped to put behind me years ago. But I have to believe that the struggle is more than the struggle. It offers the potential for real victory: small triumphs in our lives that, if not making us saints, nonetheless represent signposts of real achievement that we can stop and admire for a moment... and then I hope pass, like Lot, without looking back.