By Tom Thomas.
“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.”- Ebenezer Scrooge, A Christmas Carol
“It is time to put the Christmas decorations up.” My better half’s statement signals to me this is the start of the festive season. The Christmas ornaments and decorations, the crib and the tree need to be brought out of storage and assembled. Some of the tasks like putting the star on the tree, and hanging the star outside our home fall to me. It does involve quite some physical dexterity and gymnastics to do the needful correctly. When all is done to the satisfaction of all at home, we stop back and look at the results of our handiwork. It is satisfying to see the twinkling of lights on the tree, and the lighted crib beckons us closer.
The Advent season indeed beckons all of us to get closer to Him, in joyful anticipation and arrival of Baby Jesus. What are the steps we can take to make it a meaningful preparation, as we seek the arrival of Baby Jesus like the wise men did? One of the pointers for me is to emulate what my late father did without fail, year after year. Following the tradition of the Syro Malabar Catholics, where a fast is undertaken for the advent season, he would give up non-vegetarian food and drinks during this period. We would follow this practice throughout Advent, only breaking the fast after the Christmas Eve mass. Coming at a time when most of the parties of the year are held and the world seems to be at its busiest with parties galore, this is challenging, to say the least.
The Advent fast tradition is one carried forward from the Eastern Church. Fasting is not only from food and drink we like. Fasting can be from anger, and the noise from the various digital channels we are exposed to like OTT and WhatsApp , and instead feasting more on good Scriptural reading and other practises such as spending time regularly in adoration and silent contemplation strengthen our focus on him.
It is always a struggle at the beginning of each Advent season for me. To fast from the things I like for a while, to focus better on His coming arrival. And yet I try and do it. My father is not with me this Christmas for the first time. But his living example of Catholic faith and the practises he followed from his childhood always helped keep his focus on the Lord. I think to myself that my father too is one of the stars in heaven now, that can lead me to the baby Jesus in the Manger, just like the Magi were led.
This is the reason I will fast this advent. From things I like, for a while. Till His being born as a tiny baby in a lowly manager. This also will help me prepare for the Lenten season fast to follow. I read from the lives of great Saints like St Francis of Assisi who followed this practise which kept them close to Him. In fact St Francis of Assisi is the one who conceptualised and executed the first ever Christmas Crib with live animals on Christmas night 1223 in the small Italian town of Greccio.
May my heart be more open to the cries of the weak, the hungry, the imprisoned and those in need, that come before me and I did not notice earlier.
Because I was too immersed in the things I liked to care. I have to put some effort, and some preparation to meet Him. As the shepherds and the Magi did. This is the meaning of Advent- joyful preparation and a season of anticipation.
In ending, the quote from Holy Father Pope Francis on the release of a book ‘Christmas at the nativity” ( 27th September 2023) comes to mind:
“There are many of those stars, an infinite number, but among them all a special star stands out, the one that prompted the Magi to leave their homes and begin a journey, a journey that would lead them where they did not know. It happens the same way in our lives: at a certain moment some special “star” invites us to make a decision, to make a choice, to begin a journey. We must forcefully ask God to show us that star that draws us toward something more than our habits, because that star will lead us to contemplate Jesus, that child who is born in Bethlehem and who wants our full happiness.”