Anglicans Online banner More about the gryphon
Independent On the web since 1994 More than 250,000 readers More than 30,000 links Updated every Sunday

Noted This Week
Sites new to AO

News
News Centre
News archive

News flash: a summary of the top headlines
Basics
Start here
Anglicans believe...
The Prayer Book
The Bible

Letters
Read letters to AO
Write to us

Resources
Resources A to Z

World Anglicanism
Anglican Communion
In full communion
Not in the Communion

Dioceses and Parishes
Africa
Australia
Canada
England
Europe
Hong Kong
Ireland
Japan
New Zealand
Scotland
South Africa
USA
Wales
World

Vacancies Centre
List a vacancy
Check openings worldwide

Add a site or link to AO
Add a site to AO
Link to AO

About Anglicans Online
Back issues
Staff
Awards and publicity
Beginnings
Sponsors
About our logo

Our search engine
 

Hallo again to all.Full Homely Divinity Advent Calendar Jesse Tree

In an older reckoning, today is called the Sunday Next before Advent. It is the last Sunday of the church's year, the day when at the end of ordinary time we ask God to stir up in our hearts fresh energy for a new season of extraordinary time. 'Advent tells us Christ is near', and Advent starts in just one week. Hymn-writers and preachers of yore found this a good time to 'prep' those around them for the mediæval December's set themes of death, judgment, hell and heaven. We have it on good authority that there was a time without hyper-early carol muzak and strangely premature Christmas commerce beginning in October. Instead, once upon a moonbeam, churchfolk sang

Stir up our wills with grace divine,
And make them to resemble thine;
That we may work thy works, O Lord,
And reap at last thy great reward,
When thou shalt sit upon thy throne
And make thy righteousness our own.*

Schoolchildren had other thoughts about what needful things were sure to be around the corner when each November they reached today's BCP collect and lessons:

Stir up we beseech thee
The pudding in the pot.
And when we get home
We'll eat it all so hot!**

We should be honest and admit that we have not thought very much about righteousness or eschatological rewards in the last week, let alone hot puddings in Victorian pots. Some of our thoughts have been with faraway friends, nearby deadlines, and upcoming travel. Still other thoughts have been concentrated in the beeswax of two candles we lighted at a church a few miles from home on Thursday afternoon: one for Thomas, who stands in need of courage, and one for Amber, whom we asked God to gift with strength.

But most of our thoughts have actually been about Advent calendars. Whether they are filled with chocolate, or their paper doors hide riddles and scripture texts, or whether they peel away to reveal parts of a composite picture, we have never lost our early fascination with them. They teach us gently how to be surprised by joy; how to be delighted by small things; how to save and focus fascination that can be 'new every morning' like the 'love our waking and uprising prove'. They tune the young heart—no matter the age of that heart's owner—to wait, to prepare, and to look at the same time to a near horizon and a far one. They teach us to peer carefully behind a door, or just below the surface of what we see, there to find hidden worlds and secret truths the naked eye will never find.

Advent on the railsAdvent calendars are the only day-by-day markers we know that impart so effectively to children (and many adults) the spirit of eager spiritual anticipation that ought to be the still, warm, quiet heart of Advent. That simple calendars can do this so well, in the guise of daily surprises, strikes us as more important than serious churchfolk may always notice. They bring the daily hope and daily sweetness of Christianity into the home—and into the heart—more tangibly than the creations of any liturgical committee or church commission can ever hope to do. We have purchased a few, and we can't wait to mark each day of the coming season with a brief moment of wondering, daring, opening, discovering, and thanking.

This is the last week in which to dust off or seek out an Advent calendar from which to learn the little, lovely lessons of joyful, careful waiting. It's not just chocolate on the other side.

See you Sunday, no longer next before, but next within Advent.

Our signature
All of us at Anglicans Online

Last updated: 22 November 2009
http://anglicansonline.org

* William Bullock, Songs of the Church (Halifax, Nova Scotia, 1854)

** The Times (London), November 25, 1863

A thin blue line
This web site is independent. It is not official in any way. Our editorial staff is private and unaffiliated. Please contact editor@anglicansonline.org about information on this page. ©2009 Society of Archbishop Justus
. Please address all spam to press@anglicansonline.org