- As I pondered writing this piece, I was facing the temptation to do some light content as a way to kick things off on a happy note for MSPCatholic. While I certainly hope that this site is a place of joy and connection, it seemed strange to me to not acknowledge the weight of everything that is going on in the midst of this site relaunch. Please know that I hold all of you in my prayers and I hope to connect with you soon. – NV At the risk of sounding like another cliché blog post about “unprecedented times” and “facing difficulties,” I hope that you’re able to give yourself permission to not be OK right now. Things are not “normal,” and I don’t know if they ever were.
A few months after the McCarrick scandal broke back in 2018, one of my theology professors said in a talk about the state of the Church: “we think that things are very bad right now. Things have always been bad.” I’m still not sure if that thought was consoling or terrifying, but it served as a severe gut-check for me at the time, as I had just started seminary during a very difficult chapter for the Church.
So can we say the same thing about where we are at today? Have things always been bad, and these times have just uncovered woundedness that has always been there? I can’t say I know the answer to that question, but I do know that we all need to give ourselves permission to not be OK right now. Things are difficult, and some people are barely keeping it together. I couldn’t tell you the number of phone calls and Zoom calls and socially distanced walks that have been filled with pain and disquiet and struggle[1]. Pretending that things are not difficult would be profoundly naïve. So many of us are in a time of near despair as we “wait for things to get better.” If I had a nickel for every time I’ve heard the phrases “I can’t wait until we have a ____,” or “I can’t wait until ____ is over” … Advent and Christmas are swiftly approaching, and we’ll face this again. Things will hardly look familiar. Both of these seasons have meant so much to me over the years, but in the current days in which we live, I can hardly see their meaning past all the difficulty. Hearing the first strains of “Joy to the World” on the radio (played all-too-early) almost seems like a cruelty in these days, until you arrive at a later lyric in the song: “Let every heart prepare Him room.”
The lyric referencing the need to find a place in our lives in which to invite the Holy Family to rest as we await the Nativity of Christ is especially poignant now. In Advent, in this time that the Church has given us to prepare for the Incarnation of our Lord, a time given over to vigil and silence and waiting, we come to a crossroads where each one of us must decide which direction we will take:- Take the default option and doggedly continue in the stress and quasi-despair that we all seem to be facing.
- Take this Advent season to prepare Him room.
Fr. Alfred Delp was a German Jesuit priest during World War II who certainly knew what is meant by “unprecedented times.” He was arrested and executed by the Nazis in 1945 after tirelessly serving his people through the chaos of the Third Reich. He had a special love for the season of Advent, and a book of his homilies and reflections was recently published, titled Advent of the Heart. In a homily delivered in Munich, 1943, for the First Sunday of Advent, Delp’s words seem to be aimed directly at us seventy-seven years later:
This should be our first Advent light: to understand everything, all that happens to us and all that threatens us, from the perspective of life’s character of waiting. We must endure all the blessedness and un-blessedness of waiting because we are under way. The character of life is to keep going, to keep a lookout, and to endure until the vigilant heart of man and the heart of God who meets us come together: presently in the true interior meeting in the sacraments and, later, in the final homecoming. God enters only His own rooms, where someone is always keeping watch for Him. Indeed – like all other things in another sense that the Lord will add unto us – we will experience again: ‘those who really wait for Him will not be disappointed.’[2]
Delp believes that the anxious waiting and uncertainty should really be given over to keeping a lookout, a vigil, as we await the coming of our Lord. In keeping this vigil, we learn to prepare our hearts for the Lord, because “God enters only His own rooms, where someone is always keeping watch for Him.” We can learn to turn this dictatorship of anxious waiting and “un-blessedness” into a posture of vigil, receptivity, and preparation.
Alfred Delp
Psalm 130 springs to mind as we confess this anxiety before the Lord, rich with imagery of waiting and keeping vigil:
Out of the depths I cry to you, O LORD!
Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
to the voice of my supplications!
If you, O LORD should mark iniquities,
Lord who could stand?
But there is forgiveness with you,
that you may be feared.I wait for the LORD, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
My soul waits for the LORD
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.O Israel, hope in the LORD!
For with the LORD there is mercy
and with him is plenteous redemption.
And he will redeem Israel
rom all his iniquities. But the watchmen need not be afraid or dismayed, for as St. Paul tells us: “you know the hour has come to arise from sleep, because now our salvation is nearer than before, when we came to believe. The night is far advanced; the day is near.” (Romans 13:11-12) There is hope, and it is not a hope in creating a perfect world, for “the world and its desires pass away” (1 John 2:17). There is not a single person who has not been “shaken” (cf. Luke 21:26) by the events of this year, as we all have had to do a serious check on where we place our hope. Alfred Delp again:Man stood on this earth in a false pathos and a false security, under a deep delusion in which he really believed he could singlehandedly fetch stars from heaven; could enkindle eternal lights in the world and avert all danger from himself; that he could banish the night, and intercept and interrupt the internal quaking of the cosmos, and maneuver and manipulate the whole thing in to the conditions standing before us now. That is the first Advent message: before the end, the world will be set quaking….
If we want to transform life once more, and if it really ought to become Advent once more – Advent of the homeland, and Advent of hearts, and Advent of our people, and Advent of all peoples – and included in all that, the coming of the Lord – then the one great Advent question for us is whether we can come out of these shakings with the resolve: Yes, arise! It is time to awaken from sleep. It is time for an awakening to begin somewhere; and it is time that someone places things again in the order that they were given by God the Lord. Moreover, now it is time for each individual to use every opportunity to guide life into this order now – and to do it with the same “unshakeability” with which the Lord will come.[3]
There’s a strange kind of freedom that comes from not placing hope in this world, for in the midst of the shaking, the darkness, and the anxious half-sleep, we learn to find the One who is unshakeable, the One who is light, the One who says “awake, O sleeper, and rise” (cf. Ephesians 5:14).
And so my dear friends, let us take the second option. This Advent is a unique opportunity to prepare a place for Him as never before, for we who have been shaken choose to use this to keep vigil for the One who is coming as the daybreak.
And so how do we prepare Him room? How do we transform this anxious half-sleep into eager vigil for Him?
First, I’m thoroughly convinced about the deep connection between physical state and spiritual posture. The physical act of preparation can lead beautifully into spiritual preparation, and so take a look around your room, your house, your parent’s basement, or wherever you happen to be living this Advent, and ask yourself if there is a place that you can prepare for this great vigil. I am blessed to have a chair in my room with a lamp and a small table that I use first thing in the morning to pray. The simple setup, combined with some religious art and a very necessary cup of coffee[4] helps me to dedicate the very beginning of the day over to the Lord, rather than turning my phone on or worrying about the to-do list. Find a place where you can physically prepare Him room: a clean, simple setup that will lead you into daily prayer and vigil.
Second (just as in Lent), find something to do that will draw you further into this season. While Advent is not a penitential season in the same way as Lent, it is still a time of preparation and invitation. This could mean setting aside something that you use to distract yourself (*cough* social media *cough*) and learning to sit in silence, or finding a prayer practice that might be new and untried for you (for instance, tradition would have us say the Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary on Sundays in Advent instead of the Glorious Mysteries[5]).
Third, find an Advent-themed event at your local parish to go to, especially if that event is a penance/reconciliation service. What better way to prepare your heart for the Lord than to get honest with Him about your weakness? Many parishes have admirably responded to various restrictions and protocols to offer Confession in a safe manner, and Advent would be a great time to take advantage of that. (By the way, if you’ve been waiting around for a sign to get back to regular Confession, this is it.)
Finally, don’t rush through this Advent season on the way to Christmas. Delp’s whole point is that there is something unique and privileged about the time of Advent where we can learn amazing things. At the risk of sounding like another “true meaning of Christmas” rant, protect the season of Advent by refraining from Christmas music and decorations. Try, rather, to keep with the spirit of the season by waiting in eager vigil for the Lord. A great way to do this would be to spend some time with the daily readings[6] as we walk through this season; they are rich in imagery and bear the possibility of fruitful reflection in these days.
And so, my dear friends, prepare Him room. Prepare Him room in your anxiety. Prepare Him room in your schedule. Prepare Him room in your relationships. Prepare Him room in your homes. Let this Advent be a new chapter in all of our lives, where we give our anxiety over to the Lord, who invites us to change it into eager vigil, until He comes again.
Nicholas Vance is a seminarian studying for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis. A West St. Paul native, he came back to the Faith his freshman year of college, and became involved with Saint Paul’s Outreach and the Catholic Studies community. He graduated from the University of St. Thomas in 2018 with degrees in Communications & Journalism and Catholic Studies. A rueful marathoner, a Röpke-Wojtyła Fellow with the Catholic University of America, and a once-upon-a-time youth minister, he loves hiking, reading, playing music, and the delightful first sip of coffee in the morning. He proudly calls Transfiguration in Oakdale (“the rockin’ East Side”) his home parish, and is in seminary formation at the Saint Paul Seminary.
[1] Speaking from a measure of personal experience, anxiety can be an incredible burden. Please reach out if you want to chat about your experience of anxiety and struggle these days; I would love to hear from you.[2] Delp, Alfred. Advent of the Heart: Seasonal Sermons and Prison Writings, 1941-1944. San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 2006, pages 46-47. This book is amazing. Give it a read.
[3] Delp, Advent of the Heart, 42. No seriously, give this book a read. [4] This is under the inspiration of Ven. Fulton Sheen, who famously stated “The average American is physically, biologically, psychologically and neurologically unable to do anything worthwhile before he has a cup of coffee. And that goes for prayer too. Even sisters in convents whose rules were written before electric percolators were developed would do well to update their procedures. Let them have coffee before meditation.” From Sheen, Fulton J. The Priest Is Not His Own. San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 2005. Preach it, Fulton. [5] Cf. https://www.usccb.org/how-to-pray-the-rosary [6] You can sign up for a daily email of the readings at https://www.usccb.org/
