Sermon on Advent
After thanksgiving, it is natural to get into the Christmas spirit. The Spirit changes right after Thanksgiving is over. This is natural. Over several centuries, we have consecrated this time as Advent. Mary was pregnant with God, and we are in expectation of the arrival of God himself to pay us a visit. It is also the expectation of the Second Coming - the Hope of the Messiah to come and save us from our sins. Spiritually, Advent celebrates both First and Second comings, and this is why even those who are not believers feel the Spirit of Hope and Charity in the air.
Man is half-god and half-beast. We must feed our Spiritual side. This is the time.
Dawn’s Holy Light
As I was driving through Eastern Oklahoma on the way back home after Thanksgiving - it was dark when we left. But, then it was dawn: the time when light appears, but before sunrise. This is the state of limbo. It is expectation that the Holy Sun will rise. It is embedded in the human DNA to experience Hope during the Dawn. The orange horizon of Eastern Oklahoma staring toward Missouri was a high Spiritual event of my Thanksgiving travels. I recalled the piece of poetry I recently read; it had the phrase “Dawn’s Holy Light.”
This combined with the experience of the orange Eastern Oklahoma horizon made for a sweet spiritual event.
We Pagans
Everyone in the West is a Pagan. Yes, it is quite a thought. Nietzsche taught us that we in the West no longer believe in God the same way our ancestors did. God to us is some distant Deistic designer of the universe or some voodoo-like Pentecostal frenzy of tongue-talking ecstasy. Neither of these is spiritual in any way, and we have lost God in the process of clinging to either notion. What we have is paganism. Nietzsche said that all that matters now is strength and beauty - this is essentially Darwinism, and essentially what our ancient pagan ancestors worshipped. So, we will worship the beautiful and the strong, and we will abandon that which is weak and not so beautiful. This is a Lamentation from Nietzsche, and not a cause of celebration.
However, during Advent, even though we are all essentially pagans, we still feel the glimmering light from the centuries of being bathed in the spirit of Advents years past. Between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day, we feel the ancient spirit of Advent awaken in our souls, and for a season, we do not act as Pagans, but as brothers and sisters - for a time, at least.
For a time, we experience the sweetness of the ancient Spirit of Christ - the Holy Spirit - from a former age of Light we no longer often experience. Faith, Hope, and Charity are alive during the season of Advent. The Weak and the not-so-beautiful become receivers of Charity.
Faith
Fate drives Pagans. Faith drives the spirit of Advent. It is a belief. It is an imagining that we can conceive, believe, and in some sense bring to reality some portion of this belief.
Hope
Hope tells is that things can be better. Faith drives Hope. We feel this intensely during Advent.
Charity
Caritas is not Love in English, but an assumption about our brothers not based upon cynicism and self-interest, but in the belief that all souls are in need of Salvation, and are grateful for the offering of Salvation. My brother gave me harsh words yesterday, but it was because he is experiencing stress in his life, and I will forbear this because he is my brother. This my friends, is the Spirit of Charity.
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So, as we experience this sweetness of Advent, let us experience - if only for a season - what our ancestors experienced as the Holy Spirit. Remember Dawn’s Holy Light, and remember your brothers in need - bodily needs, mental needs, emotional needs, and spiritual needs.
Shine a light. You be the Dawn. You be the Sunrise.
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Freddy Martini
