Tag Archives: Advent

Advent II: Signs of Hope–Lights

04 Sunday Dec 2016

Posted by in advent, Hope, Light, paying attention

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My Hope continues to need prompts. The scent and blossom of the rose give me cues, and this week the Light in the semi-dark expands my repertoire of signs. I love our Advent Candles, plopped down in the midst of closed blinds, rumpled couch covers, and uncertain plans. The world hovers with great grayness, disheveled-ness and despair. But in Advent someone keeps lighting a Light!

The Gospeller records: What has come into being in him was Life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. (John 1:3b-5)

How much I am looking for points of Light, as a former president phrases it! And I have noticed and felt them. As I am being treated in physical therapy, my healer tells me a story of Thanksgiving largesse, spontaneous, imaginative and far ranging, with compassion, kindness and long-lasting effect. In hearing about the death of  long-time saint of God, I also hear an outpouring of times and places where her milk of human kindness was served to so many with energy, intelligence, imagination and love. A community observes the anniversary of a horrendous act or terror, and despite the deep wounds that will leave scars forever, as individuals and clusters, they pray, they witness, they improve methods of protection and they support one another.

I am grateful for each voice and pen that shows a way to light the Light in Hope in this Advent season: for each prophetic pastor who speaks the Truth in Love, for each blogger who does not sink into hand-wringing or indulge in diatribes or leap to ad hominem assaults of shame and blame, for each commentator whose voice is that of the turtle-dove rather than the hawk. I receive Hope in each conversation in which the darkness is not denied, but pragmatic steps to turn the Light on are offered–writing letters to people in power; bringing in the trash cans of an elderly neighbor; giving to food programs, blood banks and toy drives. Not any of them alone bring the Light of Hope to full blaze, but each little Light reflects the Light of Life, and gives Hope.

I will keep my eyes open for points of Light this week: in the concert hall, in the shopping center, in the general stores and specialty stores, in the coffee shops, in my living room, in my inbox, on the phone, on Facebook, in the mail. And then I will ask myself where I can bring the Light of Hope–next door? down the block? across the street? to the food bank? to the start-up in service of the frail? to this particular conversation in which I find myself? If the Light is shining, it needs to shine in me, through me, with all my limitations, opportunities, and affections. And I am humming in Hope from the Iona Community, “Kindle a flame to lighten the dark, and take all fear away, ” flexing my Hope muscles in belief that the Light cannot be extinguished

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Advent IV: Love, the Star

20 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in advent, illumination, pilgrimage, seeing

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I keep looking to the east this Advent. How I long for a Star in the east that would bring us goodness and light!

Stars, keep the watch. When night is dim one more light the bowl shall brim, shining beyond the frosty weather, bright as the sun and moon together. People, look east and sing today: Love, the Star is on the way. (Eleanor Farjeon)

The promise is that the Holy One has visited/is coming in this season. When I look out east from my prayer corner, I don’t see stars. The ambient light has faded them away, or daylight is overtaking the night sky. The same is true for the anticipatory longing looks in my soul. But I trust that there is a Star shining beyond the frosty weather, bright as the sun and moon together who has appeared and will appear in my heart and in the world. So I pray in these last days of Advent:

Come, O Star of Wonder, fill me with wonder–at your created beauty, at your amazing diversity, at the endless surprises in making a way where there is no way. Shine in me and through me, so that I am a bearer of wonder along the trails that I wander, and bring delight to my companions on the way.

Come, O Star of Night, into our world of opaqueness and myopia–shine into the crevices and crannies where the Light seems absent and impossible. Shine into my own darkness, which I know is not dark to you, and shine through me so that I can go boldly into places along my path that are longing for light.

Come, O Star of Beauty, buoy me with the beauty I see in your star-shine in the world–in faces of peacemakers, in random acts of kindness by strangers, in the artistic renderings of painter, poet and composer, in birds and trees and friendly beasts. Shine your beauty on and in me that I may bring brightness to the neighborhood and city and nation awash with the smudges and soot of trying to make it through the day, trying to make sense of things, trying to make ends meet.

Come, O Star of Grace, illuminate my own own understanding of how you are present in our world, from the knottiest and most complicated issues of the day to the tiniest and most fragile of connections between people and your created world. Shine your Grace upon me that I can walk with Grace, in Grace, gracefully.

May your Love, the Star, keep shining, giving us great Light, in us and around us, until we are able to see it and follow it! Amen.

 

 

 

 

Advent III: Love, the Rose

13 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in advent, listening, open heart, waiting

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I flew to the east this past week. I didn’t encounter “weather” the likes of which I hear about in the news, but it was definitely winter where I was. There was no snow or rain, but there were bare trees and gray branches. In my own yard back at home, there were no roses left, no camellias out, not many blooms anywhere.

Furrows, be glad. Though earth is bare, one more seed is planted there. Give up your strength this seed to nourish, that in course the flower may flourish. People, look east: and sing today: Love, the Rose, is on the way (Eleanor Farjeon).

This Advent it has been a challenge to see much besides “bare furrows” in the field–loved ones suffer, old acquaintances square off, tribes stake out exclusive claims, and so many just weep in loneliness, frustration and pain. Yet on this third Sunday of Advent, Gaudete Sunday, the Church offers a rose colored candle to be lighted, both to honor Mary, the mother-to-be, and in an older time, to give respite to the darkness of Advent, by lifting some of the practices of austerity, in hope that there is a “seed” left to nourish. We are asked to give up our strength to support the tiny seed of hope nestled in the ground which seems unforgiving and barren, even when the darkness does not allow us to see what might be about to blossom.

In the twelve days left before Christmas I am turning my attention to the “littles,” the small things that might have a seed to hope in them, that need nourishment from me in order to become what they can be. I am remembering the last days of my own pregnancies, when all the big items had been taken care of–nursery ready, supplies on hand, arrangements made for getting to the hospital. What was left was the waiting and internal preparation. Was I ready to be a mother? what would encourage me, nurture my hope? would there be companions on the way? and was I paying enough attention to positioning myself to access that strength?

This Advent the “littles” I need to which I need to pay attention this year are inner ones primarily.  I have had a long run of attending to “seeds” around me in the wider world, people who have needed care, situations that have needed mending. However, the “seed” in my own heart feels buried and thirsty. So in these last two weeks of Advent I want to give up my strength primarily to that soul work. The sacred text that came to me at the beginning of Advent was this one from James 5:8–Do not lose heart…God is kind and compassionate. But these past weeks I have been moving at warp speed (for me), and I have not slowed down enough to wait with patience to notice the kindness and compassion of the Holy One. Mary was known for pondering things in our heart: I have much to ponder this week. I will do that with silence, with music and reading, with walking the labyrinth–do not lose heart! Mary was known for going to soul friends for protection, comfort and wisdom: I will reach out to beloved ones who keep bearing flames of hope by example and insight–do not lose heart! Mary was willing to receive what the Holy One wanted to give her: I am offering the little seed that is my heart to receive whatever it is that I am being given–do not lose heart, the Holy One comes to you!

Love, the Rose, in on the way–in the little seeds of my life this Advent.

 

 

Advent II: Love, the Bird

06 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in action, children, compassion, paying attention, waiting

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Birds, though you long have ceased to build, guard the nest that must be filled. Even the hour when wings are frozen God for fledgling time has chosen. People, look east and sing today: Love, the Bird, is on the way.  (Eleanor Farjeon)

As I look eastward out my window in the morning, I have a host of birds that entertain and intrigue me–mockingbirds, wrens, crows, the busy hummingbird quite in love with the fig tree next door, who drops in often, and if the wind is right, seagulls come screeching through. One morning we were even visited by an adolescent hawk, resting mid-flight on her way to somewhere. But even in our temperate climate, there seem to be fewer birds aloft than in spring and summer months.

According to the carol, the Advent task is guarding the nest that must be filled. This week my heart longs to know how to guard and protect the nests for the little ones in our world who are at risk. We are closely connected to our neighbors in the east in the towns of San Bernardino and Redlands. Beyond the colleagues who were slaughtered last week, I am in grief for the children whose nests have been permanently upended because of  that day–the 6 month old child of the shooters, the little ones who were left without a parent after the shooting, the learners who endured hours of lock down while the sorting out process continues, the neighborhood gaggles of young people who now have been close up and personal to the effects of terror. How am I called to be a protector of nests and the ones who inhabit them?

I am reminded again and again how in both testaments of the Bible, there is a call to protect, to care for, to be advocates for the widows and children. A friend here is part of an interfaith coalition of people who are are becoming advocates for undocumented immigrant children shipped in from the border, awaiting in warehouses for the judicial process to grind its wheels. And I support with energy the many gatherings of faithful ones who labor at feeding the hungry children, housing the homeless ones and providing for the well being of so many vulnerable ones. In the movie “Mary Poppins” the most poignant plaint is from the Bird Woman on the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral, singing “Feed the birds, tuppence a bag.” How am I to feed the birds this Advent?

 The promise is that Love, the Bird is on the way this Advent. In a very provocative book, Consider the Birds, pastor Debbie Blue writes about the appearances and meanings of birds in the Bible. Some are metaphors, some are illustrations, some are even names for the Holy One. When I am praying for Love, the Bird, to come quickly, I have in mind one not named in Scripture, but one from the Celtic tradition, who is the symbol for the Iona Community, the Wild Goose. I am told by members of that community that she was chosen as a symbol of the Holy Spirit; they were drawn to her because the wild goose is known for going where it will, like the Holy Spirit, and sometime it makes what seems to us to be a great mess. Certainly I don’t know how and when the Spirit is coming among us, but I believe she will, and I feel sure that in guarding the nests of the little ones, some neat and tidy ways of societal organization might be left in a mess.

Even so the Spirit and the Church cry out: Come, Lord Jesus!

The whole creation pleads: Come, Lord Jesus!

And meanwhile, I am paying attention to the places where I can guard the nests that need filling and care and feed the little birds that are here in this world.