Advent: The preparation for the coming of Christ
The beginning of a new year signals an opportunity of renewal and the commitment to forming good habits. As often as not these fall away as the pressures of the year mount, but our commitment to renewal each new year indicates the genuineness of our hearts and minds. The season of Advent denotes the beginning of the Church’s new year and in the same way offers us an occasion at which to rekindle the preparations of our hearts for the coming of Christ. Christmas celebrates the first of three comings of Our Lord but the preceding liturgical period, Advent, sets us up to be ready for them all. Our longing and yearning for the birth of the infant Jesus becomes our ardent desire to see his coming in majesty at the end of time. Good habits formed during Advent are excellent ongoing practice for the spiritual life. They will hopefully last the entire year thus readying us over time for the eternal reckoning. It is for this that we pray in the Collect of today’s Mass: “Grant your faithful, we pray, almighty God, the resolve to run forth to meet your Christ with righteous deeds at his coming, so that, gathered at his right hand, they may be worthy to possess the heavenly kingdom.” Just like the habits we commit to in our new year resolutions, the virtues are habits that we possess more fully the more they are practiced and it is through their attainment, guided by Charity, that we become Christ-like and the promise of Salvation is realised.
Between these comings of Christ—that in history at the Nativity, and that in majesty at the end of time—lies the third coming of Christ, that of mystery. Every day he comes to us in different ways, and just like the other two comings, we ought to prepare the way for him. When he entered this world as a baby his coming was missed and ignored by the world, so much so that he was born in an animals’ stable. That tragedy of missing his arrival risks being repeated when he comes in mystery day after day. His encounters are gentle and unassuming, and we are at risk of being desensitised to his comings in our lives. We may encounter him in the smiling face of another, in a meal shared, in the prayers of our heart, in the waters of baptism and the vows of marriage. He unites with us in the form of bread and wine at Mass, and he is present in every word of Scripture. Our return to the preparation of our hearts and minds during Advent, therefore, also benefits our reception of Christ in mystery everyday and configures us to him in readiness for his coming in majesty. Daily his comings are our rest and consolation, in the last coming he will become manifest as our life, and today, the first day of Advent, we begin preparations to celebrate his coming as our salvation. “Come, Lord Jesus!”