Light

Dear sisters & brothers in Christ,

I pray that you are blessed and got loads of candy for Halloween. Personally, I just can’t believe it’s November. Some tell me it’s because I am growing older, but I reject that hypothesis and prefer to believe that is it due to living closer to the Arctic Circle, which has a smaller circumference and needs less time to make a full rotation, and therefore the days are shorter. (Attention all you science people, don’t go messing with my theory, or should I say “delusion?”)

While I am not a fan of winter coming and the cold that comes with it, I do like the look of fall, the colors and the clouds. One advantage of living in the northern hemisphere is that it is in tune with our liturgical calendar. As we see nature around us go dormant (and seemingly die) we are reminded of our own mortality. We mark this time with two feast days: All Saints, which includes All Hallows Eve (Halloween), and All Souls Day. As all around us nature seems to be dying, these holy days remind us that we too are mortal and will one day return to the earth as the dust from which we came. The days (light) grow shorter and the nights (darkness) get longer. It would seem that this darkness/death is winning. While we began this month thinking about the mortality of flesh, we end it giving thanks to God for all our blessings, great and small. The following Sunday we will enter Advent and begin preparations for the coming Light of Christ, The Light of The World, who will be born to banish darkness & death forever.

Therefore, we should live always as Children of the Light. No matter how dark and bleak things might seem, we have peaked ahead at the end of the story. We know who will be victorious. And so, we venture forth with a smile on our face, even into darkness and toward the valley of death, knowing that our Lord, The Lord of Light & Life, is with us always. We should fear not! For Light always, I repeat ALWAYS, and in ALL WAYS, defeats darkness.

P.S. As a side note, we Redemptorist will celebrate the founding of our congregation this Tuesday, November 9th.

In the Redeemer, Fr. Rick