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Most Christians think of Advent as the coming of Christ in the future.
Christmas is coming … on December 25. After that, it will come next
year on December 25. Many of the readings also point to the Second Coming
as that point in the future when, as the Creed recites, "He will
come again in glory to judge the living and the dead." —
"again," as in, "sometime in the future."
Learning to recognize Christ's presence here, now, in
this moment!
Throughout history, Christians have tied themselves in knots trying to
predict when that time will be. The real gift of Advent, indeed, of the
gospel itself, is learning to recognize Christ's presence here, now, in
this moment. The time is now. The real point of His message was
about pausing and experiencing His presence. About coming back to where
we are in this instant because this is where He is, in this body, this
temple, this space we occupy. The only peace we can know is by learning
to return here, where He is, always inviting us to be present with Him,
perfect in our imperfection.
The doctrine of the Second Coming was an integral part of my childhood.
Something that would happen in the future. The Kingdom of Heaven coming
down to make this imperfect world perfect. An event that would transform
me, in my sinful form, into something sinless. And so, holiness was always
about striving, about pursuing, because who I was in my imperfection was
wrong. So wrong that it required an event outside of space and time that
would transform form and time into something no one understood –
Perfection. The greatest spiritual task was to love perfectly, and I equated
loving perfectly as something I could not achieve in the moment, because
it would not occur until I was ultimately something I am not, that is,
free of self. Ergo, what I am is wrong.
Since I could never achieve perfection, my very striving, or pursing,
only made me more conscious of my inadequacy. I would become discouraged,
and internally "give up," or turn away from myself and in doing
so, from those I sought to love. This was true particularly when others
did not respond as I thought they should to my pursuit. Then, my suffering
was compounded. Not only had I failed, there was something inherent in
me that was insufficient. If only I had loved more perfectly, the other
would have responded and loved me in return. It became a vicious, endless
cycle. A broken record spinning round and round. Pursuit of having, of
achieving, of becoming or acquiring something I did not have, was not.
And when I failed, despair, giving up, turning away. Then pulling myself
up by my bootstraps and trying again, and again failing myself and those
I sought to love.
Even my spiritual practice became a place where I was caught in the cycle
of pursuit, failure, and turning away. In "trying" to love myself,
all I learned was how unequal to the task I was. I thought I was the busy,
spinning record. I had to learn to stop pushing against a self that was
wrong, and know the embrace of Christ, for whom I was absolutely, unconditionally,
right … as I was, in the moment. It was not until I began to learn
to become conscious of myself in the moment, of my spinning, busy mind,
of my underlying sense of fear, sadness and inadequacy, and learned to
see those things in myself as Christ sees them, without judgment or censure,
that I began to realize that I was not the spinning, broken record.
To be in the moment with Christ...
What if we could actually be with the Nativity? Experience the inner
experience of Mary, of Joseph? Ignatian spirituality encourages the practitioner
to do just this. To be in the moment with Christ. This practice is far
less a journey into imagination as it is the experience of Christ folded
into our own inner knowing. When Christ was conceived, he became form,
but he had always been, so his "coming" was not a coming into
being, but a coming into this particular form. A zygote, dividing, dividing,
dividing again. And his mother felt exactly what any woman feels when
she learns she is pregnant. "I can't feel anything at all. But
I know something is different in this form called my body." And
as the fetus grew, the ability to sense its presence grew too. Physical
discomfort, the changing body, the fear of the unknown. And then childbirth,
both mother and child feeling the pain, uncertainty and then, ultimate
wonder when the event in the moment evolves into the warmth and certainty
of this miraculous human form cradled in the arms. A series of moments,
each one with a different experience, a different knowing.
My serious spiritual practice, the place where I truly began to wake
up to knowing Christ present in me and with me, began in this way. As
it progressed, I began to learn that I did not have to choose between
pursuing spiritual perfection and turning away in despair from loving
myself and others. I began to experience the place between pursuit and
turning away. That place is invitation: the invitation of my open heart.
I began to become aware that my heart beats and expands because of the
underlying presence of Christ, that it is a lovely place, so full of compassion
and caring for others. A place of goodness.
The essence of "God With Us"...
 I
have begun to learn to sit quietly, even with what I see as my flaws,
my imperfections. I have begun to practice presence there, in that place
where His love flows constantly into my heart and connects me to every
other living being in my life. In this practice, my prayer has become,
"show me how to be present in this moment with You,"
not, "Oh, by the way, can you come here and do this or do that, or
even, just be here." He already is here. He has always been here.
In learning to pause and breathe in His presence, I am learning to come
home to my own heart, which rests in Him and in so resting, opens out
to others.
This is the essence of the gospel of Christ, of "God
With Us". The Kingdom of Heaven, Christ told us, is within
you. In this moment, in the seeing who we really are, perfect in our imperfection,
balanced with our being present in the invitation of Christ to the compassion
that is the ground of ourselves as His creation.
From this perspective, Advent is less about some future event, some coming
Christ that we have to wait for, than it is about the essence of compassion,
invitation without criticism, expectation or anxiety, that is waiting
for us in the recognition of Christ as the ground of the heart in each
of us, in this moment. God With Us.
Dawn Bowie
Photo Credits: Embroidery
image used in title from Embroidery Library www.emblibrary.com/EL/default.aspx
Image of woman at the window from stock.xchng.
Photographer: Anita Patterson, Douglasville, GA, United States
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Dawn Bowie is an attorney in Washington DC and a long-time member of one of the international cyber communities that has been one of the important catalysts for Catholica.
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©2006
Dawn Bowie
[Index of Commentaries by Dawn Bowie]
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