Curling up with a good Advent

December 19, 2004

I am sure that those of you who like reading novels have had the experience of re-reading a book that you read much earlier in life and have been both surprised and fascinated by how much more you seem to be getting out of it the second (or third) time round. The general outlines of the book may still be in your memory somewhere, but many elements in it you will have completely forgotten about and there will be so many fresh new insights that you will scarcely believe that you read the book when you were much younger. You will see a much greater sophistication in the plot, the characters will seem more richly developed and more interesting, the depiction of human motivation and behaviour more intriguing.

A rewarding experience. Yet why should this be? Surely the text of the book remains exactly what it was? The words you read the second time are exactly the same ones you read the first time, so what could explain the different effect they are now having on you? Only this: you are the one who has changed.

You are not exactly the same person as you were ten, twenty, thirty years ago. You are bringing much more experience of life and human nature to your reading, much more understanding of the world. There is now much more two-way traffic between you and the book, traffic which is immensely fruitful and productive. You are no longer a passive observer of the novel, you are now a contributor to it.

It strikes my that it is rather similar with Advent and Christmas.  We had this season last year and we had it the year before that and we had it ten, twenty, thirty years ago. Why do we have to keep having it? Because we have changed since then. What we can bring to the understanding of it is much greater than before.  Our experience of life is much more extensive and, if we are reflective type of people, which Christians should be, our understanding of what it means to be a human being is much richer and deeper.  That being the case, we are in a better position to grow in understanding what it meant for God to become a human being in Jesus Christ: the mystery of the Incarnation, which we are about to celebrate at Christmas.

Growing in the wisdom and understanding which the fruit of Christian love is, let us never stop thanking God for the love which produced that great mystery.

Fr Hugh Duffy SJ