Advent

The Virtue of Re/connecting

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A few weeks ago, I heard about a younger student who was worried they were out of dress code during a Red, White & Blue day we were holding in honor of Veterans Day. Wearing our school gym uniform (a maroon shirt and gray sweatpants) the student felt his shirt wasn’t really red. I happened to be a wearing one of our school shirts and walked into the class where he was and commented “hey, we’re wearing the same shirt!” I stood next to him and reassured him that he was wearing the right colors and the class gave a little cheer.

FULL DISCLOSURE: As a brand afficiando, I am quite comfortable accepting maroon as a substitute for red, especially when children are involved! 🙂

Why share this simple story? Because in looking at it a bit deeper, you realize it’s more than an example about dress code rules; it’s about finding connection with one another. When I was walking back to my office I was overwhelmed with the feeling I had just made that boy’s day and nothing special on my part contributed to it. In that one moment in time, I literally and figuratively stood with him and connected for his class to witness and that made all the difference.

As with so many other feelings and experiences during these final weeks of 2022, we must remind ourselves of the value of reconnecting with one another. The holiday season is naturally a time to do just this, but we need to remember the intentionality that comes with this habit: meeting people where they are. Reconnecting with others in our lives is not a simple proposition. Many of us face various obstacles that do not make this easy or even possible. We often cite personalities or events that prevent us from making these connections. This emphasis on the who or what of reconnecting allows us to rationalize that things can never change. But they can, and they do!

What we forget to consider is when we are. C.S. Lewis reminds us, “You can’t go back and change the beginning but you can start where you are and change the ending.” Reconsidering the role of time in our lives allows us to rediscover the virtue of connecting with those close and possibly those further distanced from us. Connecting may require us to sacrifice, look beyond ourselves, and embrace our vulnerability. But the potential returns are immeasurable!

It’s a Great Day to be a Bulldog!

What is Coming?

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Some years, we patiently await the birth of Christ; others, we rush toward it. Some years, we look forward to new beginnings; others, we avoid them altogether. This year, many of us may have experienced what psychologist Adam Grant called languishing, the neglected middle child of mental health. Neither flourishing nor depression, we may have had a sense of being joyless and aimless. Perhaps we found ourselves more forgetful about appointments and more guarded about attending unnecessary events. If 2020 was forgettable, then 2021 was meh.


During the liturgical season of Advent, we are reminded once more about the humble beginnings of Christ: a manger surrounded by livestock, anxious parents, and an unknown future. We are reminded that kingly gifts may attract the eye but the presence of new life warms the soul. We are reminded that there is always room for our neighbors. The value of community and what it does should encourage us
all. The Irish poet John O’Donohue once wrote that, “True community is not produced; it is invoked and awakened. True community is where the full identities of awakened and realized individuals challenge and complement each other. In this sense both individuality and originality enrich self and
others.” What a community does is often more important than who comprises it.


Perhaps in a Trinitarian way, good things happen in threes. Maybe 2022 is the year of reimagining and renewing the priorities in our lives. Maybe it’s a time to take stock of what we have come to love and appreciate as invaluable during an otherwise surreal time in our lives. Then again, maybe it’s “just another year.” And even if it is, we should be vigilant in safeguarding what we hold to be true and cherish our time with it. If the Advent season teaches us anything, it is that the virtues of faith, hope, and love have no variants; they are constants in the life we have and the one we are called to.

It’s a Great Day to be a Bulldog!

Pieces of Peace

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These days it feels as if there’s so much to say, but words continue to fail us. The emotional toll of this year seems to drive everything, or so it feels. We cautiously approach the end of 2020 hoping that by the stroke of midnight on December 31 all will come to a close (or at least we’ll wake up from this nightmare). But we should always be vigilant not to let anxiety overwhelm us for God’s peace goes beyond our everyday experiences. St. Paul reminds us in Philippians 4:6-7, “Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

The fourth Sunday of Advent is symbolized by peace, having celebrated hope, love, and joy. Peace itself is often misunderstood as an idyllic tranquility that comes over humanity like a cool breeze; after all, it’s the refrain of pacifists and war critics. But that ignores the personal, more inward thrust of what true peace holds for us as individuals. We talk about coming to peace with a loved one or watching a friend pass away peacefully, as if to remind ourselves that it is found in smaller moments of grace in our lives. Peace does not present itself as an overwhelming wave but rather as a droplet in the ocean. The Prayer of St. Francis so many of us are familiar with echoes this sentiment:

“Lord, make me an instrument of your peace
Where there is hatred, let me sow love
Where there is injury, pardon
Where there is doubt, faith
Where there is despair, hope
Where there is darkness, light
And where there is sadness, joy.”

When we encounter shadows in our life, we are called to bring light. And this can only happen when we act to better the lives of those around us. Peace reminds us that “and then…” always follows each experience of pain or suffering. Imagine the despair of Mary and Joseph seeking shelter in a hopeless situation, only to bring the Christ child into the world (“and then…”); recall the passion and death of Jesus, only to be outdone by the glory of his resurrection (“and then…”); remember when you yourself suffered and felt there would be no redemption, only to…. (“and then…”). The fragmented nature of our lives means that even peace presents itself in pieces. Fragments still unite to make things whole and complete while allowing the true light of our lives to shine through. Fragmented memories still allow us to reflect on the blessings and grace that continue to envelope us. And as the culminating virtue in life uniting hope, love, and joy in the Advent season, peace is a reminder that it–not injury, doubt, despair, darkness, or sadness–has the final word in our lives.

It’s a Great Day to be a Bulldog!

An Empty Manger

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Ten years ago, my parents recorded an audio book of “The Night Before Christmas” as a gift for (at the time) our only son Gabriel. At the end of the story, they say his name wishing him a Merry Christmas. When we listened to the book the other night with both boys (Daniel was born in ’14), Daniel turned to me incredulously and said, “Well, that was dark,” noting the absence of any reference to him in my parents’ remarks. I then had to awkwardly explain to him that there was a time when he was not yet here and it gave me pause to think about what it means for someone to simply not be. During the season of Advent, my thoughts were drawn to the manger and its empty space.

Nativity scenes decorate our homes, places of worship, and work spaces. Until Christmas morning, our focus is on an empty manger; a common, less than regal, bed for a savior. It’s anything but special and yet it is in that space that we wait patiently for a great event to happen, for someone to become. We embrace the time that he is not yet here. But even in that space of hope, of new beginnings, we know how the story ends. Our faith calls us to realize that the birth of Christ must lead to the Cross. The Cross of the Resurrection is what transforms this world into new life through the Kingdom of God: “already, but not yet” built in our lifetime. The building of of the Kingdom calls us to continue the waiting, the work, the struggle. In short, the empty manger allows us to realize the fullness of new life in the Easter miracle!

As we meditate on the birth of Jesus, let’s remember that through his life God entered our world in an otherwise forgettable setting. A king, born in a stable surrounded by livestock, changed our world and how we come to see our place in it. May we always remember what it means to empty ourselves into the lives of one another and to realize that the Christmas miracle continues to reveal itself in every moment of every day.

It’s a Great Day to be a Bulldog!

Waiting

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Traffic. Delays. Lines. We experience waiting on a daily basis. It is usually met with frustration and an elevated emotional response toward those people or circumstances that seem to create or aggravate our waiting. In short, we don’t like it or look forward to it.

A few years back during the holiday season I was flying back to California to visit family when a storm canceled my flight. While I was in line waiting to reschedule, a man yelled to the airline employee, “Well I have to be somewhere!” I thought to myself, “So do I. We all do; it’s an airport.” After all, who goes to an airport to visit the airport? But his indignation has stayed with me for sometime because I think in a perverse way he captures the angst most of us experience during the holiday season: arriving somewhere.

The joy of the Advent season calls us to recall the joy in the mundane, the anticipation, the journey. The third Sunday of Advent is known as Gaudete Sunday or a time to rejoice in preparation for the birth of Jesus. [Liturgical footnote: it’s also only one of two Sundays where the priest wears rose color vestments; the 4th Sunday in Lent, Laetare Sunday, is the other]. As a child I remember seeing the rose candle in the Advent wreath and thinking, “We’re almost there!” This December, let’s all remember to enjoy this element of moving closer to something, however slowly it may feel.

It’s a Great Day to be a Bulldog!