Just Can't Wait

We live in a world of right turn on red. Our cars roll through stop signs. When the traffic signal changes from red to green, we have grown immune to the impatient toot of the driver behind us. Despite our faithful participation at Sunday Mass, there aren’t many breaks cut for other drivers at our back gate, as the church traffic flows non-stop through the stop sign.

A long tradition in the Church is the Season of Advent with its waiting. The Catholic Church, along with other liturgically based churches, offers the opening of the liturgical year with a time of anticipation. In one sense, this is a basis for prayer and spirituality throughout the year and in each of our lives. Advent, like all prayer, waits for God, searches God’s actions in our lives, and lives in anticipation of God’s interacting with our human history.

As long ago as the 1940's, Pius Parsch, a liturgical theologian, offered the insight of praying the liturgical year. His breakthrough in spirituality was that the symbols and rhythms of the Church’s liturgical year offered us the opportunity to explore the mystery of Christ in our lives.

The Praying Church
Advent is an example of this praying-Church spirituality. How we pray is an expression of what we believe. The Latin theological axiom states this reality succinctly: Lex orandi est lex credendi--the law of prayer is the law of believing. The realities of praying and believing are reciprocal. Our faith grows as we pray and our faith intensifies our prayerful encounter of God in our life.

Entry into the experience of Advent waiting is through the senses: what we see, what we hear, and what we smell. The senses in this way are the invitation to the mystery of Christ. The colors of Advent, the blues and purples, invite to the night of waiting for the dawn. These colors help to translate the scriptural readings about patient endurance, the waiting for peace and justice, and the healing of brokenness.

The lyrics and rhythm of the season call us to wait for the Kingdom of God, the time of renewed justice and peace. We long for God to show

himself within our human family and for that family to be transformed and made whole in that revelation.

Church or Mall
As the momentum of Advent builds with its symbols, actions, colors, and tunes, the spirituality of the mall poses so many challenges. Why doesn’t the worship space have wreaths yet? Couldn’t we have decorated trees? I don’t understand why we don’t sing Christmas Carols? (I can’t resist the answer to all of the concerns – because it’s not Christmas yet.)

Advent invites us, and even makes us, wait for Christmas. Blue and purple don't give way to the red and white of poinsettias nor the green of Christmas wreaths and trees. The prophets’ readings continually place in our present moment waiting for God. The Advent discipline of waiting is not a punishment of some kind. It is a discipline of prayer and liturgical celebration. Advent is a blessing time of creating an empty space and a longing heart for God.

Unlike the consumer spirituality of our culture, Advent reminds us that God, despite our best efforts to produce him, will show himself and act when and where he wills. It’s his world and his Kingdom, of which we are reminded, we don’t know the day nor the hour. We can not buy him, nor acquire his Kingdom, nor even produce conversion of heart within ourselves.

Teach Us to Pray
Like the disciples in the gospel, we ask the Lord to teach us to pray. The Church in Advent liturgy is teaching us to pray. The difficulty of the lesson is that we are being taught to be counter-cultural. We are asked to be still, to be focused, to be patient, to become more aware of life and God moving within and around us. Advent’s challenge is to lay aside distraction and the frenzy of the season.

Market economy may be good for the marketplace, but prayer is another matter. It’s about pursuing God and allowing God to pursue us. It can’t be rushed or mass produced. God’s Kingdom takes time and it’s a gracious experience.

CDH