This year, get engaged in Advent

By Tom Rinkoski

	Tom Rinkoski

Advent serves the people of God as an introduction to change. The world changed when Jesus was born. Each year we come round again to mining that mystery. As a dad I understand what a change the birth of a baby can bring to marriage and family relationships! Life before diapers is vastly different from life after, and life with two children is equal to more than the addition of one. As a grandfather I am watching that same change happening with my own son and daughter-in-law.

Families, like Advent, are built on how they accept changes in the world as they know it. When two individuals marry, worlds collide and universes are born. When babies tumble into the lives of newlyweds, life changes again. When those babies become teens, perspective gets pummeled and kneaded like dough becoming bread. As couples age, their acceptance of the ups and downs of their former changes gives them the freedom and courage to face new joys and sorrows.

As the beginning of a church year, Advent announces changes. It is an alarm clock. It is your child waking you in the middle of the night with a tale of monsters. As the season before Christmas, Advent re-introduces us to the hopes and dreams of the little boys and girls inside each of us eagerly anticipating the newness of change.

Pope John Paul asked us to make this Advent a prayer for peace. The Lord knows our world desperately needs peace. Let us not forget, however, Jesus said we should not assume easy definitions of peace (Jn 14:27). Peace does not mean the absence of change. Perhaps an Advent prayer might be for the serenity to accept the changes in our lives, and the courage to act on the grace each change offers us.

My daughter called to announce she is engaged! Theresa and I are so excited! Engagement is a time of anticipating change. Advent is like an engagement period. When Advent works well, we engage in discerning the meaning of the birth of Christ among us. Where do we see that Baby's smile and feel his heartbeat in our winter lives? If a couple's engagement period is well used, its energy is spent on reflection about marriage and the potential changes in their lives. How will the communion of their hearts, mind and souls be lived out beyond the honeymoon? That is why the church urges engaged couples to begin investing in their relationship right away!

The wedding rite symbolizes all the hopes and dreams the opportunity called marriage offers. Like the bride and groom lighting the wedding candle, we light each Advent candle with a prayer that the dreams and hopes that accompanied Jesus' birth remain our dreams and hopes today. Get engaged this Advent!

Open yourself up to the changes coming to greet you. Release your hearts to be able to see God's grace in both the positive changes and those that are harder, more difficult to accept. Actively engage yourself in welcoming change.

The December Utne Reader suggested designating a "corner of your home or apartment an imagination zone." That is a healthy and fun way to prepare the way for Advent changes. I believe Einstein said "imagination is greater than knowledge." Choose a space in your home, perhaps a corner, and mark it off with tape, rope or Christmas lights. Gather as a family just before the first day of Advent and solemnly declare this space to be the Advent Imagination Station. It is your family's private universe, a place of your own creating, where you can go to imagine how this or that upcoming change will work itself out.

Add color and features to your Advent Imagination Station. Place a toy boat in a blue ocean to symbolize the journeys into the future in which Advent is asking you to engage. One time your boat might be a freighter carrying wisdom, another it might become a pirate boat, or maybe the Starship Enterprise. Read the Sunday Gospel there each week. Encourage the family to invent stories about your collective Advent adventures and escapades. Gather treasure by listening to each other's discoveries. Together you can negotiate the stormy seas of family change, make discoveries of new gifts and talents, as well as celebrate victories. Send me a picture of your Imagination Station!

(Rinkoski is Director of Religious Education at St. Augustine Church and Student Center in Gainesville, Fla. His e-mail address is tomrinkoski@yahoo.com.)