CIRCLES OF ETERNITY . . .       

The Revd Polly M. Bowen

I write on a warm, golden, Indian Summer day. My heart sings with joy at the glorious colors outside my window, but a quick glance at the calendar tells me that the circle of our year is winding down toward Advent and the beginning of a New Year.

I ponder for a moment the circles of our lives, how we re-enact the same rituals year after year – the raking of leaves, putting away yard furniture, securing our homes against the harshness of the coming winter. There is comfort in our rituals, the assurance of knowing what to do when, and of knowing why we do what we do.

In the Church we have our repeated rituals also – Trinity season is nearly behind us, and the gray days of watching and waiting (amid the hustle and bustle) of Advent are upon us. With the Rector away on sabbatical I am especially mindful this year of the many details I mustn’t forget: I have spoken to the altar guild and been assured that we will again have an Advent Wreath ready for the first Sunday. I have ordered new vigil lights for the chapel, consulted with Mother Frieda and the musicians of the parish about Christmas music - weeks in the future, and yet it must be settled now. I have urged and cajoled heads of committees to submit articles for the Apostle, written new schedules for the Lay Ministers (have you given me your email address yet?), and a host of other mundane but necessary tasks. And at night I go over all of them in my mind, wondering if I have forgotten anything.

I wonder – would it matter so very much if I did forget something? Are we such slaves to our repeated rituals that we couldn’t roll with the punches and do without something if we had to? Of course not, but I feel such love for this parish that I don’t want its people to be without a single thing that they have come to cherish or that supports their love of God.

It seems we live our lives in a perpetual circle, returning time after time and year after year to the rites and ceremonies that give us comfort. Perhaps the Advent Wreath with which we begin the year is a metaphor for Life, leading us round again through the time of warning and watching and waiting to the eventual journey to Bethlehem and the celebration of the Christ child. Perhaps when we add in the artificiality of human Time, the wreath becomes a spiral leading us ever upward from what was to what is to what will be as we contemplate eternity in the Presence of our Lord and realize in great wonder that we are already living in that blessed eternity.

I wish you a peaceful Advent. I wish you tranquil days quiet with the hush of anticipation. I wish you restful nights of slumber undisturbed by worry or anxiety. I wish you the joy of holy expectation, serene and secure in the tender love of our Lord.

Be still! Our Savior comes!