Speak to Me Sunday: Memory and Hope (First Sunday of Advent)

Before Mass last night I reflected on the past few days of our family gathering and how, despite a tumultuous 2020, there was still so much to celebrate. And the fact that Thanksgiving slides effortlessly into the Advent season, a season which embraces memory and hope, is just as it should be ...

Readiness in Memory and Hope

Yesterday I pulled out my 2021 planner, something I do every year at this time. It's a beautiful planner. There are pages with quotes and blank spaces to write down goals; most importantly, 365 empty squares are lined up like stepping stones going forth into a year of tomorrows. 

It dawned on me how, in big ways and in small, each of those stepping stones leads me on a journey propelled by Time which marches forward in seconds, minutes, days and years.  With every breath, with every step, with every thought or action or prayer, I am on a journey.

We are all on a journey.

Sometimes the journey is planned and carefully mapped out, but other times it yanks and pulls and drags us where we do not want to go -- through illness, incarceration or grief as we recognize what without understanding why. 

Sometimes the journey can be a battle with inner demons of self-doubt, alcoholism, or drugs. Sometimes it calls us to foreign lands, a new career path, marriage, or a religious vocation. 

Often the journey is exciting and adventurous, but just as often it’s a whirlwind of ordinary with carpool, dinner, laundry, work, and children.

I turned the pages of my brand new planner, and as I filled in the squares with birthdays and anniversaries and family trips, I saw all the empty squares more as stepping stones of hope rather than blank squares of the unknown. 

I then looked at my old planner, at the squares of yesterdays which were once tomorrows, and saw stepping stones of memory.

Tonight, we will light a candle to mark Advent’s passage, and I am grateful for this season with its gift of time to both recognize the journey and reflect on it -- to gather and learn and step forward in readiness. In his book, Seek that Which is Above, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI) describes Advent as a connection between memory and hope; that is, the healing memory of the God who became a child, and the hope that memory brings.

Memory. Hope. A readiness to journey onward.

Isola San Giulio

The Way of Contemplation

"Every journey begins near you"