It is the most wonderful time of the year.
With Thanksgiving at a close, it is time to break out those grandiose sweaters, watch terrible Hallmark movies, and listen to Sufjan Stevens' Silver and Gold. It is officially the Christmas season.
I love this time of year.
However, as much as I love sugar cookies, hot chocolate, and watching Elf every chance I get, that is not why I love this time. To me, it is the spiritual events taking place
I will stop you here before you stop me. This post is not a cliche "reason for the season," "war on Christmas," or "putting Christ back in Christmas" articles that annoy the living parasites out of us. While I love baby Jesus and the incarnation, December 24th/25th is just the beginning of what is going on.
December 2nd marks an important day for Christians. It is the start of the Advent, which is the start of the entire Church calendar.
To me, just as the nativity narrative sheds light as to why we have items like Santa, the Church calendar sheds light as to why we have holidays like Christmas and Easter. Over the next few posts, I plan to dedicate Simple Kingdom to the Advent season, but first, I'd like to share why I have grown to love the Church calendar.
What is the Church Calendar?
Calendars are one of the many ways we have attempted to measure time. They help us organize our days by sorting them into weeks and months. They also create an unspoken liturgy for our lives. We know that the month of October is associated with the leaves starting to fall and children getting their costumes ready for trick-or-treating. We know that our allotted year begins on January 1st and ends on December 31st, often celebrated with parties and future goals. Calendars also help us remember our collective history. Any American would connect July 4th with Independence day, and images of BBQs and fireworks quickly come to mind, but also reverence for soldiers as well as the heritage of where America came from and the vision of where it can go from the present.
In the same manner that our secular calendar creates an organized way of viewing time, the Church calendar is a way for Christians to view the changing seasons in light of the Gospel narrative. The specifics of the calendar vary depending on denominations, but the sum of it is the same. This calendar year begins with the time of Advent and ends with Ordinary Time. The seasons are Christ with us, Christ for us, Christ in us, and Christ through us. The means of how these seasons are expressed is through the times in the calendar. Similar to how autumn can be seen differently through the eyes of September versus November.
Why Recognize the Church Calendar?
As stated earlier, days like the 4th of July and Thanksgiving throw us into the past and give us eyes for the collective future. They shape who we are as a people. The Church calendar is no different in that it helps shape a narrative for our own lives.
The calendar helps us reorient our lives around the narrative of the Gospel and the early Church. In Advent, we await the coming of Christ. In Epiphany, we look at how different the world is now that the Incarnation has taken place. In Lent, we acknowledge the need of Christ. In Ordinary Time, we ask ourselves what it looks like to be people of Christ through the Spirit.
This underlying, year-round telling of the story of Jesus and his kingdom gives us eyes to see what he has done for us, what he continues to do, and what he will do in the future. It also serves as a call to the disciple, that asks what we will do in reaction to this unfolding narrative.
Advent is approaching. Trees are dying, the weather is getting painfully cold, and the sun is up a little less than usual. It reminds us of the wrongs being done in the world. So, we put lights in the evergreen, put wrapped gifts of promise under it, singing hymns to God, and like the early Church, we sing "come, Lord Jesus Christ" as we remember his first coming in the flesh.
We spend this time looking at the what it means for Christ to come in the flesh, and for him to come again. Christmas and Advent remind us of where Jesus has entered human history and where he will enter again. It is like in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, when the Pevensie children saw Santa as Aslan's return was approaching. Chrismas signaled to Narnia that its long, bitter winter was coming to an end and that their king was coming to set things right.
- Eric J. Blessing
Below is an image depicting the Church calendar, courtesy of my wife, Hartley. I hope her artistic insight helps bring clarity to where my words fail.
With Thanksgiving at a close, it is time to break out those grandiose sweaters, watch terrible Hallmark movies, and listen to Sufjan Stevens' Silver and Gold. It is officially the Christmas season.
I love this time of year.
However, as much as I love sugar cookies, hot chocolate, and watching Elf every chance I get, that is not why I love this time. To me, it is the spiritual events taking place
I will stop you here before you stop me. This post is not a cliche "reason for the season," "war on Christmas," or "putting Christ back in Christmas" articles that annoy the living parasites out of us. While I love baby Jesus and the incarnation, December 24th/25th is just the beginning of what is going on.
December 2nd marks an important day for Christians. It is the start of the Advent, which is the start of the entire Church calendar.
To me, just as the nativity narrative sheds light as to why we have items like Santa, the Church calendar sheds light as to why we have holidays like Christmas and Easter. Over the next few posts, I plan to dedicate Simple Kingdom to the Advent season, but first, I'd like to share why I have grown to love the Church calendar.
What is the Church Calendar?
Calendars are one of the many ways we have attempted to measure time. They help us organize our days by sorting them into weeks and months. They also create an unspoken liturgy for our lives. We know that the month of October is associated with the leaves starting to fall and children getting their costumes ready for trick-or-treating. We know that our allotted year begins on January 1st and ends on December 31st, often celebrated with parties and future goals. Calendars also help us remember our collective history. Any American would connect July 4th with Independence day, and images of BBQs and fireworks quickly come to mind, but also reverence for soldiers as well as the heritage of where America came from and the vision of where it can go from the present.
In the same manner that our secular calendar creates an organized way of viewing time, the Church calendar is a way for Christians to view the changing seasons in light of the Gospel narrative. The specifics of the calendar vary depending on denominations, but the sum of it is the same. This calendar year begins with the time of Advent and ends with Ordinary Time. The seasons are Christ with us, Christ for us, Christ in us, and Christ through us. The means of how these seasons are expressed is through the times in the calendar. Similar to how autumn can be seen differently through the eyes of September versus November.
Why Recognize the Church Calendar?
As stated earlier, days like the 4th of July and Thanksgiving throw us into the past and give us eyes for the collective future. They shape who we are as a people. The Church calendar is no different in that it helps shape a narrative for our own lives.
The calendar helps us reorient our lives around the narrative of the Gospel and the early Church. In Advent, we await the coming of Christ. In Epiphany, we look at how different the world is now that the Incarnation has taken place. In Lent, we acknowledge the need of Christ. In Ordinary Time, we ask ourselves what it looks like to be people of Christ through the Spirit.
This underlying, year-round telling of the story of Jesus and his kingdom gives us eyes to see what he has done for us, what he continues to do, and what he will do in the future. It also serves as a call to the disciple, that asks what we will do in reaction to this unfolding narrative.
Advent is approaching. Trees are dying, the weather is getting painfully cold, and the sun is up a little less than usual. It reminds us of the wrongs being done in the world. So, we put lights in the evergreen, put wrapped gifts of promise under it, singing hymns to God, and like the early Church, we sing "come, Lord Jesus Christ" as we remember his first coming in the flesh.
We spend this time looking at the what it means for Christ to come in the flesh, and for him to come again. Christmas and Advent remind us of where Jesus has entered human history and where he will enter again. It is like in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, when the Pevensie children saw Santa as Aslan's return was approaching. Chrismas signaled to Narnia that its long, bitter winter was coming to an end and that their king was coming to set things right.
- Eric J. Blessing
Below is an image depicting the Church calendar, courtesy of my wife, Hartley. I hope her artistic insight helps bring clarity to where my words fail.
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