December 9, 2015

The Christian faith must be firm that the dwelling place of God is with creation, just as the dwelling place of humanity is in God.  To be able to live within this understanding, our senses need to be purged – for the modern world has dulled them, by excesses of noise, sights, and images flooding our senses into insensitivity.
A Table in the Desert: Making Space Holy, W. Paul Jones, p. 86

How is your Advent going?  Are you preparing properly for the Christmas feast?  Do you have lights strung, trees decorated, lists checked off, cards in the mail, and cookies baked?

This, of course, is not the point of Advent.  The world in general, and advertisers in particular, will tell you that the above is most certainly the point of getting ready for Christmas, with no thought of what it means to live into the already and not yet, and certainly no thought of celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas.

We are continually inundated with, as Fr. Jones points out, an excess of noise, sights, and images that dull our senses.  We get it everywhere, but here's some particular information regarding advertising.  In a 3 hour, 13 minute college football game played earlier this season, there were 24 commercial breaks, 136 total commercials, an average of more than 5 commercials per break, and just over 50 minutes of air time for commercials.  A 2013 study showed that, during an average 30-minute TV broadcast, there were 14 minutes and 15 seconds of commercial time; with an increase in the number of 15-second spots, thereby increasing the number of commercials people see.  And in November, 2013, Business Insider estimated that children between the ages of 2 and 11 see over 1000 fast food commercials.

That's a lot of excess noise.

Part of Advent is learning to slow down and wait.  Part of Advent is learning to live with expectant hope.  Part of Advent is knowing that God is with us in both the already and the not yet.  Part of Advent is recognizing that God dwells with us here in creation, and that we are meant to dwell with God in holy space.

Where, then, can we go to find holy space?  Maybe the better question is, “Where can't we go to find holy space?”  The answer is, “You can go anywhere, as long as you work to make the space holy.”

Begin the day with quiet Morning Prayer, either at home or in the chapel.  Turn off the background noise and meditate in silence on something good that happened, or a time when you saw God at work during the day.  Sit at a bus stop and pray for the people rushing by you.  Go to a park and listen to the sound of God's creation.  Stop for 15 minutes and pray the Noonday Office (BCP 103).

We are surrounded by holy space.  The problem, as Fr. Jones points out, is that we have let the modern world dull our ability to see them, hear them, and find them.  This Advent, may you find a holy space in which you make time to actively wait, in which you learn to live into the already and not yet, and in which your dulled senses are flooded, resharpened, and refocused to experience God in the mundane.

Amen.