Advent Evenings of Recollection
Advent Service Worship Aid (PDF)
Advent Evenings of Recollection with Rev. Thomas M. Santa, C.Ss.R.
St. Alphonsus Parish, Grand Rapids, Michigan, December 14-16, 7:00pm
In-Church (with limited seating and safety protocols in place) and also live streamed on the St. Alphonsus Parish Facebook page and website. Each evening will last for approximately one-hour. There will be song, ritual, and preaching, all reflective of the Season of Advent. Reconciliation will be available each evening from 6:30pm-7:00pm.
Monday Evening, December 14: “I am the Handmaiden of the Lord.” Lk 1:38
A young woman, seemingly sheltered from the harshness of living in a land that is both occupied and oppressed, parented by a man and woman of deep faith, Joachim and Anne, became the unexpected instrument of the Incarnation. Her response in faith to the invitation of the Angel who visited her would not have been unexpected, but it was nonetheless heartfelt and without condition. The single question was a question that was natural, reflective of her experience of life. What was to come, what happened next, “the details” as we might identify them today, were lacking. The angel’s invitation was indeed an invitation to a great adventure, a grace-filled journey, a path that would lead to an unknown future.
Mary is called, and rightfully so, the “first disciple.” As disciple she was not in charge of the journey. There was more to be learned than there was to be remembered. There was even more to release and to set free so that what was needed could be birthed into life. Her journey was the first Advent journey but by no means the last such journey.
Tuesday Evening, December 15: “Now you can dismiss your servants O Lord.” LK 2:33-38
The prophecies of Simeon and Anna were the exclamation point of hundreds of years of faithful waiting. Pa- tience personified as the People of God waited for the manifestation of the Holy One of God. When the day of the long-awaited revelation was upon them Simeon and Anna praised God. The time of fulfillment was at hand in the person of the Infant Jesus, presented in the Temple by Joseph and Mary.
We too have all-ready experienced the coming of the Incarnate Word of God but we have not yet experienced the fullness of the promised revelation. We live, as people of faith, in the real tension of the “all-ready and the not yet.” It is an essential experience of our spiritual practice. Advent reminds us of this tension and brings into focus the experience of what it means to patiently wait.
Wednesday Evening, December 16: “A voice of the one who cries out in the desert.” Lk 3:1-6
John the Baptist was the voice that proclaimed in the desert that the time of fulfillment was at hand. Repentance was required to prepare oneself and the community for the moment of the anticipated revelation of God. In John’s mind the moment was clear and without doubt. It would be a moment where all the old injustices would be set right. The powerful would be banished and the rightful heirs would take their place. When Jesus appeared at the River Jordan to be baptized John recognized him and proclaimed him as the anointed one.
Yet, despite the clarity of what John believed and preached, the anointed one did not act as John imagined. There came a point (Lk 7:21-22) when John had to ask Jesus: “Are you the one who is to come or are we to ex- pect someone else?”
In the Baptist we can recognize our own journey of faith. We can recognize the commitment that is needed, the clarity that seems to be promised, and the struggle to accept and believe.