Recently two friends (from different churches) shared with me the saga of a man who is upset and visiting other churches because his church is promoting Advent. It is the belief of this man that Advent is a highly liturgical invention of the Catholic Church. He feels participation in Advent redirects people’s attention away from God and has the potential of destroying the faith.
The feelings of this man show a lack of understanding about the true idea behind an Advent celebration. Advent in its purest and simplest form is a period of waiting in anticipation for the beginning or advent of a future, expected, anticipated event. Advent is a season of preparing our hearts to receive Christ. One book says the secular world is more interested in spiritual things during December than at any other time of year. Advent makes a difference!
The dictionary defines Advent as the arrival of a notable person, thing, or event. synonyms include arrival, appearance, emergence, materialization, occurrence, dawn, birth, development; approach, and coming. One illustration for this word given in the dictionary is a child awaiting the advent of the new school year. Another definition which drives the current series of blogs is the world’s awaiting the advent of the Savior. During Christmas we anticipate the coming of Christmas Day with it’s story and activities.
Historically Advent was inspired by Lent, a season of prayer and fasting to encourage preparation for Good Friday and Easter. In 380 AD the Council of Saragosa, Spain established a three week period before Epiphany for spiritual preparation. The Council of Macion, France followed suit 200 years later. The first Advent liturgies are attributed to Pope St. Gelasius I (d. 496).
It should be noted that the early developments leading to Advent as we know it today were all spiritual. These were based in prayer, scripture reading and self denial; not pagan practices, movies or commercial consumerism which fills the pre-Christmas period today. Advent candles, Christmas Trees, stockings hung by the chimney with care, presents, holiday sales, Christmas parades, bowl games, and other trappings of the season are all late arrivals to the Advent season.
Advent ideas seen in many calendars, or as shown on my website (under Advent 2015 tab) are designed to draw people closer to the real Christmas. The book Advent Journeys was written to take the reader back to the first Christmas. In the pages of this book a reader will discover the personalities, desires and efforts of the cast and characters of the Christmas story of the Bible.
Advent is a season to discover God’s love … for God so loved the world He sent His only begotten Son into the world to bring forgiveness and salvation. This is the Joy of the Christmas season.
No comments:
Post a Comment