Advent Hope

About half way into the second reading, a mom arrived to church, without a dad, but with a brood of children. Her teenager, first in line, leading the way into the sanctuary, stopped and stood still paralyzed by the scrutiny she felt when the congregation turned to see who was late. The mother, with a baby on her hip, ran right into the back of the motionless teenager. The collision turned the mom’s hurried-get-everyone-dressed-and-in-the-car-faster-ANNOYANCE into what-the-heck-are-you-doing-you-just-made-me-stub-my-toe RAGE. She grabbed her oldest by the top of the arm the way irate moms do (apparently you’re never too old for that) (I had been wondering) (there were definitely fingernails involved) and she growled from somewhere down deep, “JUST. WALK.”

While most people were polite and turned away once they got a good look at who couldn’t get their shit together on time, I watched the scene unfold. The mom looked around to see who had witnessed her anger and caught eyes with me. I tried to smile and hoped that my smile didn’t feel like condescension. What I really wanted was to ask her if she wanted to get a margarita after church. What I really wanted was to tell her that I feel it too even though technically I was on time.

The holidays are lonely. People aren’t who we wish they would be. There are empty seats at the table. The expectations are so high they are childish. The realities are so inferior they make us feel foolish. It seems like everyone I know is losing it in one way or another right now. I feel it, too.

But, we hope.

We hope for everything to get easier. It always does.

We hope for everything to hurt less. It eventually will.

We hope. It’s what we do.

And, hope is beautiful, but it carries a certain amount of sadness, doesn’t it? There is a yearning inherent to hope requiring patience while we are expectant for something that is eluding us, that is still out in front, unreachable... but forseeable.

And I don’t think we are foolish at all.

To hope is Advent. Precisely, actually, to hope is to journey through the season of Advent.

As Christians, our hope points us to the One who is coming. We wait with expectation sweeping the surfaces of our hearts that we might prepare Him room to operate and move until one fine day He returns in splendor! Together, we wait. Together, we hope.

This morning when the priest said, “We live in a time of ‘already’ but ‘not yet,’” I saw the tardy mom reach over and straighten her teenager’s hair, removing it from the neck of her sweater, smoothing it down her back, perhaps getting a jump start on the sweeping of her heart. My heart leapt for them both.

In this season of Advent I am challenged to look at the ways that I wait and long for God. In these times of restlessness and despair where peace is not yet ours, I am challenged to arise and renew my hope as I look forward with passion, longing, and desperation while realizing that one of the ways that the Lord brings hope just might be through me.

Advent themes like hope, peace, joy and love sometimes feel complicated for me. But I stumbled upon something recently. You may know that the Carmelite nuns are an ancient order whose spiritual focus is on contemplation as prayer, community and service. The Carmelites focus Advent on something different: their themes are waiting, accepting, journeying and birthing. I read that and felt a little burden lift because I felt like those words had room for me.

Advent, Advent is the Church’s way of observing and remembering, of marking the truth that God came to be with us once, is still with us, and he is coming again to set all thing right.

I found that mom after church. I put my fist out. Reflexively, she bumped it without knowing why. She smiled up at me, questioning but hopeful. I looked around at my chaotic brood and said, “Solidarity. That’s all.”