Preparing to Prepare

The Advent Wreath is a great little Christmas tradition but, like most traditions, it varies from one community to another. All things mutate as they’re copied and, as in biology, the mutations that work in a given context survive. My version is a simple evergreen wreath with three purple candles and a pink:

· Purple, a sombre colour, reminds us that waiting for God is a solemn, dark time – not pitch dark, however, as God is always with us in a transcendent way, but that deep purple, sunshine’s-not-quite-gone-forever dark.

· Pink, the third candle we light, is the hope of dawn that never quite leaves us.

· The evergreen base is everlasting life, God-life, the source of all life.

Some people add a white candle in the centre representing Jesus, and some use different colours that stand for different things. In fact, in the churches I’ve pastored, we’ve done the wreath in so many different ways from year to year that I finally came up with The Advent Rule just to stop all the bickering: “Whatever way we are doing it this year is the way we’ve always done it.”

Our themes this year, as in all previous years, will be: love, peace, hope and joy. We will begin on Sunday, November 29^th, but first I want to address a little crankiness that pops up every December in one form or another. For a while it was, Why don’t they play religious carols in the mall anymore?; before that, Why can’t we have a manger scene at city hall?; and this year it’s, Why are they trying to keep us from saying Merry Christmas?

I think this generally comes from the States where Christendom is still hanging on, and Christians still imagine they should be in charge. Losing your place as the established religion is a bit like going bankrupt I suppose. At first you’re disoriented, but as you recover your senses you find that the first to return is your sense of humour, which is, of course, your sense of proportion. Our American cousins are not quite there yet, but they’re coming along.

A friend sent me a link to It’s Called Christmas, a song by Go Fish. It’s got a bit of an edge, but it’s actually a little more fun than cranky. You can hear the humour sneaking into the conversation, and that’s the beginning of the end. Before they know it they’ll be developing a fondness for this post modern Babylon. And who knows where that might lead?

Click on the title, give it a listen, and tell me what you think.