Doing Advent right

It’s the time of the Feast of Christ the King, which marks my annual one-woman Advent restoration campaign. In CS Lewis’ book,  The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe the reign of the White Witch in Narnia means that it is always winter and never Christmas.

In our culture, we suffer from a similar problem, except that in our case, it is always Christmas and never Advent. My father, Lord have mercy on him, used to say, “It is now Christmas every day”.  He talked about getting an orange for Christmas, a rare and exotic fruit for most Irish people in the 1920s. (My father would be 107 if he were alive today.)

He meant that treats that used to be special are now taken for granted. For many of us, with the notable exception of people who are struggling financially, stuffing ourselves silly is a daily option for many of us rather than something that happens once a year. Toys that once would have made children’s eyes pop out on stalks are now commonplace. Gifts are exchanged far more frequently.

When we lose Advent as a season, we lose many gifts, not least the gift of patience.

There is a beautiful poem about Advent by the poet Patrick Kavanagh. I must have been about 16, sitting in Mrs Kenneally’s wonderful, soul-nourishing English class, when I turned the pages of Soundings to Patrick Kavanagh’s Advent. I don’t know why that first line spoke to me so immediately and so deeply. “We have tested and tasted too much, lover./ Through a chink too wide there comes in no wonder.”

Tested

God knows, I had tested and tasted nothing at that stage. Far from being worn out by experiencing too much, I was positively sheltered. Perhaps I was just at that painful moment when childhood is about to be left behind forever and was already mourning “the luxury of a child’s soul” and the capacity to be stirred to wonder by the “newness that was in every stale thing”.

In the poem, Kavanagh speaks about fasting in Advent, the dry, black bread and the sugarless tea. Today our culture pushes instead Advent calendars that promise us treats for every day of Advent. Nor is just a chocolate.

Astrid and Miyu, a UK jewellery brand, offers a solid gold Advent calendar, a steal at £1,340 sterling, but don’t worry, because the brand has embraced sustainability. That may seem like a far-fetched example but a quick Google will bring up stationery, cosmetics, and skincare brands – all flogging Advent calendars ranging in price from €50 to hundreds of euros.

Individual satisfaction achieved through consumerism is the best our culture has to offer for Advent. It is very far from what Pope Benedict wrote about the season:

“The purpose of the Church’s year is continually to rehearse her great history of memories, to awaken the heart’s memory so that it can discern the star of hope.…It is the beautiful task of Advent to awaken in all of us memories of goodness and thus to open doors of hope.”

Hope

Our entire world needs hope at the moment, embroiled as it is in wars and rumours of wars, political polarisation and radicalisation, and what some people are now calling ‘global weirding’ as extreme events like flooding and storms batter the planet.

All of us could do with re-discovering what Kavanagh eventually discovers in his poem, the joy of what he calls ‘ordinary plenty’. 

Instead of rushing everywhere frantically, we can count the blessings of having friends and families to care for and become more aware of the bereaved and lonely, for whom Christmas is really difficult. 

We might take time to phone someone, instead of sending a cursory text. We might make an arrangement to meet.  We can pray for healing and wholeness. And if we are one of the people for whom Christmas is difficult, we can pray for the grace to go on and to bring something good out of what has hurt us and left us raw and wounded. We can pray for the courage to hope when hope seems impossible

Advent is a season where we look forward to light, even though the days grow darker.  The commercial Christmas lights go on too early, not to mention the fact that they are environmentally unfriendly.  However, Advent candles are a reminder of the comfort of light in darkness.

As the saying goes, if you are sick of Christmas by December 25 – the first day of Christmas –  you are not doing Advent right. Having a reflective, preparatory Advent needs a change of mind and heart and a humble submission to God’s grace. I pray that all of us will live Advent so that, in Patrick Kavanagh’s words, ‘Christ comes with a January flower’.