I had a birthday this month and had a wonderfully understated day. Originally I had plans to see a live performance in New York City but weather did those plans in and I had to move to Plan B, which involved a movie and then a plan to go to a swanky restaurant for a birthday dinner. But I decided I wasn’t much for the big meal and so it wound up being Plan C: just a movie and a nice, pedestrian meal of soup and sandwich and…..time. Time together with my spouse, just talking, about the movie we just saw, about our meal, about planned travel over the next year. I don’t get a lot of time with my spouse like this and this is the “quality time” I very much enjoy, particularly given that we are both in careers that involve constant movement and demands on time. But that freedom to be free was truly a gift. It was better than any “birthday present.” My birthday present was presence.
The commercialism of the holiday season inculcates a need for rushing. Have to get the tree and put it up. Have to get the shopping done for holiday presents. Must go to the food store to get the ingredients for the holiday meal. It’s all gotta get done and….now!
In doing all of this, are we really present? Is the meaning of Advent in the commercialism of preparation, or in our preparing of our faith, of our spiritual life?
I love Christmas music and have since I was a child. I am forever scouring new releases of recorded Christmas music and in obtaining re-releases of old favourites that have been remastered per the technology of the day. My brother and I had a tradition when we were younger of playing music in a darkened room illuminated only by the lights on our Christmas tree. We called it a “vigil”. We did nothing but listen to the music and look at those lights. We weren’t caring about what the world was telling us we “had” to do or get. It was such a gift to be so present, silence punctuated only by the sounds of the music playing. To this day, we still talk about this and though separated by miles in recent years we still observe this practice in our respective ways.
I’ve always felt quite at home in a darkened church nave. In my younger days, I would often drop by the church of my youth and walk through it to make sure all was OK — I had been given a key to the church by the lead clergy — and invariably I would wind up in the nave. In the pitch darkness, there was a peaceful quietness that was always reassuring. I’d have a little conversation with God in those moments because there was presence. That’s why when I visit different churches I almost always visit the nave on my own when all is said and done. It is a present, a true gift, to experience such presence.
Find that liturgy that helps you profess and strengthen your faith, that brings you grace and peace. Give yourself this Advent the perfect gift: the gift of presence.
