<p>from the School Chaplain</p>
Over the last few weeks I have taken every opportunity at the start of the various school chapel services to wish everyone a ‘Happy Advent’! However, on reflection I am not sure it is catching on, but it is very much a personal crusade which I will keep on championing!
Why upset the proverbial apple cart? Well, this term is our Advent term, and we are now in the actual season, so it makes sense on that level. But we are so used to proclaiming ‘Happy Christmas’ as soon as December arrives that saying anything else just seems out of place. The confused looks on people’s faces when I wish them a ‘Happy Advent’ will not deter me though, as I do think it makes sense, and being mindful of the season in this way can help us all manage the demands of Christmas.
Our lives can be busy enough without adding all that comes with the planning and preparation that Christmas brings with it. As well as my role at the school I also lead a large and active local church, so I am very aware of how pressurised it can all feel, but I also believe that it is meant to be a time of at least some joy! Advent as a season is one of preparation, principally for Christmas itself, but it has also served to prepare people for baptism at Epiphany which on the 6th of January celebrates the arrival of the Magi at the stable. Epiphany comes at the end of the ‘Twelve days of Christmas’ and as the song makes clear those days remain a time of gifting and celebration.
My point in wishing everyone a ‘Happy Advent’ is that we would enjoy the full Christmas season, all twelve days, rather than believing it to be all over come boxing day. When I was a child the shift patterns my parents worked often led to us having our Christmas lunch on a day other than Christmas day, and maybe even then the seeds were being sown for me to appreciate the full season and not just a few days after the relentless build up. Advent is the preparation not just for one day but for a period of celebration and reflection. This term which is coming now to an end is the longest of the year and often the most demanding, so it is only right and fair that we do not simply have several weeks off but seek to cultivate a mindset which releases us to really mark that we are ‘halfway out of the dark.’
In a number of my RS lessons I have been asking the pupils why we celebrate the birth of Christ on the 25th of December? The accepted answer is that followers of Christ adopted a Roman festival marking the passing of the shortest day of the year. The winter is often long and dark, and it is wonderful to have an opportunity to mark that the halfway point has passed. There is a powerful resonance here with the Christian story in noting that we are ‘halfway out of the dark.’ Continuing armed conflicts across the globe, as well as natural disasters, changing weather patterns and the sheer complexity of living our lives can rob us of any sense of hope that things can change. The central message of Christmas that Jesus is God coming into our messy world and lives to show us that there is another way to live is a powerful picture.
So that is why I have been wishing everyone a ‘Happy Advent’ this year, that we would prepare to really celebrate this Christmas season and in the words of John chapter one verse five, know that ‘the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.’
Happy Advent (and Happy Christmas!)
- Rev'd Dr Rob Beamish