Chair's November Blog: Advent - Holding Our Nerve
Advent - Holding Our Nerve
It was so easy when the children were little.
If I said it was Advent, not Christmas, then it was Advent.
If I let them take it in turns to light the candles on the wreath, then prayers were said and sung.
If I wanted to close teatime with another symbol on the Jesse tree, then that was fine too.
If I said Advent calendars were better without chocolate - well, that was a tough one!
It's not easy to be out of step with everyone around you. They’ve all started the party and we’re still getting ready. Now is the time to hold our nerve. Take some time, just a little, to reflect on where we are.
On Sunday 1st December 2019 the Church begins a New Year. It’s Year A so we have a new evangelist guide - St Matthew - whose Gospel was written for Jews who had become Christians. As the scripture scholar Henry Wansborough tells us in his introduction to Matthew’s Gospel in Take and Read:
“Matthew uses Jewish methods of argument, and is familiar with Jewish institutions. He stresses that Jesus fulfils the Jewish scriptures and especially the Jewish Law, though not in the way that his Jewish contemporaries favoured. This made for a decided tension between Matthew’s community and their Jewish neighbours, amounting even to hostility and resulting in persecution of these Christian Jews.”
It sounds as though Matthew is more than familiar with the feeling of being out of step with those around him. So perhaps this is how it ought to feel? A little bit strange. A step into unknown territory. In contrast, for many of us, the readings, songs and liturgies of this season are all too familiar - they wash over us with all the challenge of a soft duvet.
Over the last year CPW has been reflecting on the concept of Priesthood as recognised in the baptismal anointing of all Christians. As we move into our next year of study we shift our attention from Priesthood to Prophecy. A glance at our 2020 brochure of events will reveal many opportunities for us to seek the prophetic voices of those who are ‘out of step’ with the status quo.
Perhaps this Advent could be a time when we shake things up a bit too. What about a new tradition of inviting CPW friends (and those yet to hear about us) to participate in our Icon prayer project?
However you celebrate this season, as you watch and wait, may the prophets guide us to ‘walk in the Light of the Lord’ (Isaiah 2:5).
They watch for Christ:
who are sensitive, eager, apprehensive in mind,
who are awake, alive, quick-sighted,
zealous in honouring him,
who look for him in all that happens, and
who would not be surprised,
who would not be over-agitated or over-whelmed,
if they found that he was coming at once.
This then is to watch:
to be detached from what is present, and
to live in what is unseen;
to live in the thought of Christ as he came once,
and as he will come again;
to desire his second coming
from our affectionate and grateful
remembrance of his first.
St John Henry Newman, Selection from Parochial and Plain Sermon