By Gary Topping–
I’m not a winter person.
“So why did you stay in Utah?” one of my friends asks, knowing that I’m not a Utah native. Well, I said, I have a Utah wife, a Utah career, a Utah home, and lots of Utah friends. All of those are powerful adhesives. And there are many other reasons why I enjoy living in Utah. But winter isn’t one of them.
Thus it is that Advent has become my favorite liturgical season, coming as it does right at the outset of winter. Lighting a new candle on our advent wreath each Sunday is a little ritual that my wife and I look forward to. As we add each new candle, the darkness-dispelling light becomes more intense week by week, and the hope they bring becomes brighter and brighter. There are prayers that go with each candle, adding to the joy of that little ritual. Through it all, we develop a growing sense of preparation, an anticipation that something very, very good is coming.
So Advent means preparation, and it is the only liturgical season in which tradition gives us time-measuring mechanisms like the Advent wreath and the Advent calendar. When we show up for Mass during Lent, for example, the parish bulletin will tell us that it’s the third Sunday of Lent, but most of us don’t have another way of reckoning that. During Advent a quick glimpse of the wreath or the calendar will tell us exactly where we are.
A minor miracle happened in our household this year: we actually got our Advent wreath installed before the first Sunday of Advent!
Now if I could just find something that would get me through January. . . .
