It seems that Christmas already is receding in the rear-view mirror. In reality, we should still be living Christmas lives.
I walked to the curb after dinner Monday evening to drag our garbage and recycling bins back into the garage, the pickup service having performed their weekly duties. Taking the bins out and bringing them back in is one of the weekly little chores that has become almost liturgical in the way it marks the weekly cycle of my family's life. Grocery shopping on Saturday, mass on Sunday, garbage collection on Monday, choir rehearsal on Wednesday. The weeks peel away, and these little milestones continue to punctuate them.
Anyway, as it's now dark outside after dinner, when I was standing at the curb I looked up and down our block and noticed that we're pretty much the only ones who still have our Christmas lights up. Christmas trees, wreaths, lights, lawn decorations - looks like the neighborhood has reached a consensus to pack them all in and has moved on.
In a sense, it's hard to blame them: we're all back to work now after the holiday respite. My own job is very much in full-speed-ahead mode now, the MLK holiday not even representing a speed bump on the corporate calendar; the next corporate holiday is Memorial Day, still far over the horizon. I'll take a little time off around the Triduum, but I'll need to burn a vacation day, or as we call it these days, PTO, for that.
Of course, we Catholics know (or it would be nice if we really knew) that, liturgically, the Christmas season is still in flight. The Christmas season runs from Christmas Day itself until ... wait for it ... the Baptism of the Lord, which usually* is celebrated the Sunday after Epiphany**.
And even though our lives don't feel particularly Christmas-y anymore, if we also mark our daily lives with liturgical prayer, the church's prayer books remind us that our feelings are out of sync with deeper reality.
The Christmas Season is brief but rich. There are a number of ways to slice and dice it. One way is to divide it into two segments: the first segment runs from Christmas Day until the Epiphany. During that segment, the liturgical (if not always literal) 12 Days of Christmas, the church's liturgical prayer begins (as it does every day of the year) with the Invitatory Psalm, interlaced during the high seasons like Christmas with a seasonal antiphon:
Christ is born for us; come, let us adore him.
But Epiphany doesn't end the season; Epiphany is more like an inflection point which helps us pivot from the first part of the season to the second part, which runs from Epiphany until the Baptism of the Lord. During that time, the emphasis of the Invitatory antiphon progresses from Jesus' birth to his being made manifest:
Christ has appeared to us; come, let us adore him.
We made the pivot this past Sunday, so we're in the final segment now, the stretch run of the season - but still in the season. And for those of us who are able to take part in the church's daily worship, Liturgy of the Hours and Mass, the readings, hymns and appointed texts continue to celebrate the season. Even days like Monday's (Saint Andre Bessette) which celebrate a particular saint don't supersede the season; the sanctoral and the liturgical seasons are woven together into a single, coherent and rather beautiful whole.
Anyway - in Morning and Evening Prayer, there is an appointed scripture reading, and the reading is always paired with a Responsory. The Responsory isn't a Psalm like the Responsorial Psalm in Mass; the Responsory is sort of its own beast, a brief dialogue (spoken, or even better, chanted) between the celebrant and the assembly for those who are lucky enough to be able to pray the Hours in a group; if, like me, you pray the Hours by yourself, you just pray all the parts yourself.
During this segment of the Christmas season, for Evening Prayer, the Responsory goes as follows:
(Leader): All peoples will be blessed in him, men and women of every race.
(People): All peoples will be blessed in him, men and women of every race.
(Leader): All nations will acclaim his glory.
(People): Men and women of every race.
(Leader): Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
(People): All peoples will be blessed in him, men and women of every race.
It's brief, and it's simple, but there is a wide vista, an enchanting and compelling vision, encompassed in those few lines. Jesus is revealed to us so that we may be blessed in him - "we" meaning all of us, women and men of every race, every income quintile, every nationality, every culture, every gender and sexuality - all of us. We're all given equal status and dignity by virtue of his blessing. But not only as individuals; as nations. All nations will be joined in this blessing. In response, we'll all unite (not only as individuals, but as nations), and do what the angels did on the night of his birth: we'll sing an acclamation of glory and praise. Perhaps each of us in her own tongue, according to his own cultural traditions, weaving a complex and beautiful tapestry of praise to the One God in Three Persons: the Father who made us, the Son who blesses us and saves us, and the Holy Spirit who gives us wisdom, courage, clear-sighted discernment, many other gifts and virtues.
As I prayed Evening Prayer this evening, while I was also pottering around the kitchen, unloading the dishwasher and making dinner, the television was on in the next room, broadcasting the network evening news. Among the lead stories: our president, having assassinated an Iranian general, is now threatening to follow up by destroying Iran's cultural heritage.
I don't have enough time nor patience right now to explain all the ways that strikes me as wrong. But for now, let me just contrast this incipient conflict with the vista and the vision of peace and unity among nations, as limned by this evening's seasonal Responsory.
The thought occurred to me that Christmas isn't a season to pack away and move beyond. It's a way of life. It's a year-round, lifelong undertaking. The Incarnation brought Jesus among us, and he's still among us. This stupid, unnecessary conflict that is brewing is exactly what Christmas is to save us from.
Christmas: a subversive season. Let's continue to celebrate it.
* On years when Epiphany is celebrated on a Sunday which lands on Jan 7 or Jan 8, there aren't enough days remaining in the liturgical year to squeeze in all the Sundays that we need to have a full liturgical year, so in those years (this year is not one of them), the Baptism of the Lord is moved up from the following Sunday, to the Monday after the Sunday on which Epiphany is celebrated. So on those years, the second segment of the Christmas season, discussed in this post, is only two days long, running from the Sunday on which Epiphany is celebrated until the following day, Monday, on which the Baptism of the Lord is celebrated. But most years are like this year: the segment runs from the Sunday on which Epiphany is celebrated until the following Sunday when the Baptism of the Lord is celebrated. The Baptism of the Lord is a hinge in its own right: it transitions us out of Christmas season and into Ordinary Time.
** On the Universal Calendar, Epiphany is celebrated on January 6, the 12th Day of Christmas, regardless of what day of the week it happens to fall on - just like Christmas always lands on December 25, regardless of the day of the week. In some countries and cultures, Epiphany is a bigger deal than it is in the US - in some places, culturally as important as, or even more important than, Christmas. In the US, the bishops have elected to take the option, given in the Universal Calendar, to relocate Epiphany to whichever Sunday happens to fall between Jan 2 and Jan 8. So for us, Epiphany always is on a Sunday. For those cultures that don't move Epiphany to a Sunday, there is a 2nd Sunday of Christmas which is celebrated on the Sunday between Jan 2 and Jan 8 (unless the Sunday happens to land on Jan 6, in which case Epiphany supersedes it). In the US, we never hear those 2nd Sunday of Christmas readings and texts.
Jim, our Christmas lights are still up, too. I don't take them down until the Baptism of the Lord. We don't go all out, Chevy Chase style. We just have our tree, some lights and decorations on top the piano, and a couple of window ornaments with lights in the front window. The time after Christmas is when I enjoy them the most. The sun doesn't come up until nearly 8:00 am this time of year. By which time I have been up for awhile. I like to sit in the room with only the Christmas lights on, and read or pray. That's the nice part about a Kindle, it has its own light to read by.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if any of you saw this article by Fr. James Martin. It was about doing a year-end "examen". I didn't do it at year end, I did it yesterday. Someone asked me to sub for their adoration hour, and that seemed the perfect time to look back on the previous year, and forward to the next one.
Katherine, thanks for that link to the examen by Fr. Martin.
DeleteI'd have to review my year by topic rather than by month. One of my little competence gaps is that I have a very poor sense of time-rooted memory. I can remember that certain things happened, but I don't usually remember when they happened. If a police officer ever asked me, "What were you doing last Thursday between 7 pm and 7:30 pm?", I'd have to say, "I have no idea."
Likewise, things like extreme weather which are burned into many people's minds, make no memory impression on me. I might remember that I shoveled two feet of snow from the foot of the driveway, but whether that was last winter or 10 winters ago, I don't have a clue. My wife is amazed that I can't remember details of things that made such a vivid impression on her.
Asking me to remember the good things that happened to me in February or April of 2019 is a non-starter. I may remember things that happened, but asking me to identify the time frame is a losing proposition.
Jim, my memory isn't very time-rooted either. We have been watching a British series lately, "The Unforgotten". The protagonists are cops dealing with cold case crimes. One of the episodes was 27 years prior. They managed to scare up some witnesses. Like you, I would be in trouble as a witness. I do remember what I was doing on July 14, 1972 (getting married) or June 25, 1974 (having a baby), but unless its something like that, I have a hard time hooking an event onto a date.
DeleteI really like "The Unforgotten". I wish PBS carried programming like that more often. It reminds me in some ways of Helen Mirren's "Prime Suspect" series from 20 or so years ago (or longer now?), which also was terrific.
DeleteWe sang "We, Three Kings" for the entrance hymn today (Tuesday the 7th) and "Joy to the World" as the recessional.
ReplyDeleteI am pretty much of the mind that Christmas consists of the 12 days to Epiphany, more or less. The liturgy runs up to the Baptism of the Lord (next Sunday), but when you get John and Jesus to adulthood the Christmas thing seems, to me, pretty much in the past.
When Raymond Brown put the infancy narratives into abridged, compact form for Worship magazine, he ran up to Jesus lost in the temple at age 12. Liturgists use that elsewhere. Fr. Brown's approach is scriptural. The infancy narratives, in his thinking, went to age 12 because that is the material to which none of the Apostles ever claimed, or could claim, to be eye-witnesses. He didn't go to the Baptism. As he noted, Mark begins with the Baptist preaching and reaches Jesus's baptism by verse 9. Some apostles to-be already were on the scene. Everyone agrees Mark has no infancy narrative.
But another evangelist for Christmas, born out of time, so to speak, summarized the meaning of the feast this way: "(T)o Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him."
The point being, Christmas doesn't come to an end.
Raber puts the tree up Christmas Eve. On January 6, he makes his Italian dinner, and we put everything back in the attic.
ReplyDeleteIn the Anglican tradition, Epiphany is its own season that runs to Ash Wednesday, and I guess I am still plugged into that. Certainly the evening prayer you mentioned above goes along with the spirit of the Epiphany season, when we are encouraged to think about how Christ worked in the world while he was alive, and what his vision for us was/is. It is a nice time to say the Luminous Mysteries.
Fr. Martin's examen is very like what my Jewish friends say they do at Yom Kippur, which, of course, marks the end of their religious calendar year. I tend to do these types of things in Lent or Advent.
When I was a kid, the 9th Sunday before Easter was called Septuagesima. The following ones were Sexagesima and Quinquagesima. Did the Episcopalians have that also?
DeleteNo, they are just called the First (Second, Third) Sunday After Epiphany or Of Kent in the ECUSA BCP. Latin isn't exactly encouraged in the Anglican tradition, though, fun fact, dinner grace was always said in Latin when I was at Cambridge. Maybe a holdover from medieval times when Latin was the language of scholars?
DeleteThe theme of the Anglican Epiphany season collects are calls to evangelism in some way.
Tom: The point being, Christmas doesn't come to an end.
ReplyDeleteExactly right.
Put up lights and trees and decorate when you feel like it. I always put (electric) candles in every window, usually on the first Sunday of Advent, but not always. Tree was chosen around Thanksgiving, but left outside in water until a week or ten days before Christmas. Usually down no later than Epiphany because it would be getting too dry and shedding too many needles. Candles and wreaths stay up until I feel like taking them down. They brighten the winter days.
I suspect that God doesn't really care when we decorate, or when we take those decorations down. I'm guessing too that God doesn't let rigidities like a man-made liturgical calendar have a lot of influence when it comes to judging humans who put up seasonal decorations.
;)
"I suspect that God doesn't really care when we decorate"
DeleteI think he's pleased when we try to live as citizens of his kingdom.
Confused, Jim. What do Christmas decorations have to do with living as followers of Christ?
DeleteHi Anne - I think that celebrating the full season is one very simple way that we can bear witness to the truth of the Incarnation, and its repercussions, which are vast and still reverberating today. Of course, there are other ways we can bear witness, too, including by resisting escalations to armed conflict that involve nations firing missiles at one another. And there are countless other ways that we can bear witness that "Peace on earth and goodwill to all" is not just a meaningless slogan.
DeleteBtw, when I started writing this post, it was Monday evening. By the time I was able to post it to the blog, it was still late Monday evening in Chicago, but on EST it had rolled to Tuesday. I usually don't have time to compose posts until later in the evening. That's not my best time to think, which is why I then have to edit them several times in the ensuing days to fix things.
ReplyDeleteIn this case, I changed a couple of references in the post from "today" to "Monday", as the blog thinks I wrote this on Tuesday.
"All is well" Tweeted Trump after Iran fired 22 rockets at two U.S bases in Iraq.
ReplyDeleteHe didn't say, "All is calm; All is bright."
Any candidate who promises never to tweet will get my vote. "All is well". What a maroon.
DeleteYeah, "maroon". And now high level White House advisor, Sean Hannity, has spoken in favor of full force kindagainst Iran. Oh, I forgot, Sean Hannity holds no government office at all. He's just a Fox News loudmouth who is best buddies with Trump.
Delete"kindagainst" should just be "against". Kindle is doing weird things with spell check.
Delete