Watch and Wait

"Watch". That is the last word of today's Gospel for the First Sunday of Advent. As November turns to December, I am watching the evening rain turn to snow.

Wait.The cliche in the Midwest: "If you don't like the weather, just wait." I believe that is the message as seasons, both calendar and liturgical---physical and spiritual--- change and move on: times are always changing, nothing stays the same.

We talk much of the cycle of the seasons ("the circle game") and compare it to a carousel. But we never return to where we were. Neither the earth nor its creatures are the same as one year, or ten years, or a century ago. Some changes we attempt to fashion ourselves, usually at the expense of great energy and frustration. The profound changes are the ones that come to us unannounced, as the Gospel says, in the night. Watch!

Wait! But not passively, but with attention to the signs and symbols around us. {In between the passing clouds tonight, the moon, Venus, and Jupiter are forming a rare triangle in the sky.)Watch!



Yes, the seasons form a circle. But it is not a carousel, but more like a helix, a circular staircase. Always moving, but both up and down?

We breath Advent in. We breath Advent out. We wait. We watch.