Our Homes for the Holiday

Someone said to me the other day, that Episcopalians talk a lot about Advent. We’re careful not to sing Christmas carols during Advent, we don’t put up Christmas decorations, we don’t call our parties “Christmas” parties, and we’re generally, in my words, curmudgeons about the whole thing. He said, I don’t think we will get folks to buy into the idea of Advent/Christmastide unless we do something creative with it and celebrate it.

I must admit that I have been something of a “Santa Basher” and an Advent curmudgeon in the past - for a couple of reasons. First, I don’t like to tell children that if they’re good, they get stuff, and if they’re bad, they won’t. We all know that people get stuff all the time, even when they’re very bad. And there are many children in the world who are poor and hungry and never get stuff. Then we have to find a way to explain to our children that the poor children are not bad. So it seems easier and more honest to just not perpetuate the Santa Claus myth, but to present it to children as a fun tradition. Then, by all means, tell them about the real St. Nicholas.

The reason I try so hard to keep Advent separated from Christmas is my own experience of running ragged trying to do everything, and make everything perfect, and to get everybody all the right gifts with Christmas Eve looming as a panicked deadline. By the time Christmas came I had been “doing” Christmas for so long I was tired of it. After the kids opened their presents, I was ready to take the Christmas tree down.

I think my friend is right. Let’s stop being “Advent police” and raise this season up and celebrate it for the holy season that it is. It is a time of expectancy, joy and wonder for what was and for what is to come. So let’s do something creative with it.

I ran across a “Letter to the Editor” that a friend of mine wrote for his local newspaper. He tells about a fun, creative tradition that he does to his home. I like it; next year I think I will do the same. I commend his letter for your enjoyment and illumination. From The Rev. Bob Layne, retired Episcopal Priest:

The lights adorning our home are not “Christmas Lights”. Our lights are the blue lights of the Season of Advent. Blue is the color the Episcopal Church designates to be used through the four weeks immediately prior to the great feast of the Nativity. During early and mid- December we decorate our home with the blue hues of expectation, anticipation, and waiting for Jesus’ coming again as He promised He would. There is a small candle wreath amidst the blue lights, with four candles, one lighted each week, marking our movement through the four weeks of Advent. But during Advent we concentrate upon Jesus’ return! As we recite every Sunday:”Christ will come again” The Jesus of Advent is in our future, not in our past. He it is who someday will return and bring all things to completion. In Advent, “we begin with the end”!!
Then on Christ-mass Day the blue lights are extinguished, and the bright white lights of joyful celebration shatter the darkness and blaze white in remembrance of His first coming some 2000 years ago. Christ-mass is here and we celebrate this most important event in human history for 12 festive days. Through these days we remember in thanksgiving all that the first visit by Jesus brought to human kind: freedom from guilt, shame and fear, and the gift of eternal life. In the “humble birth of the Christ child,” our redemption began. Advent “ends with the beginning”
As we await the return of Jesus in our future, we can more fully and joyfully remember His presence in our past. Advent emboldens Christ-mass. Don’t miss it. Please come by and give us a toot on the horn so that we can wish for you a most “blessed Advent”.
In Advent anticipation…