Deepening Our Lives in Christ
Besides affirming life and remembering it, celebration is filled with expectations for the future. If the past has the last word, a man would imprison himself more and more the older he became. If the present were the ultimate moment of satisfaction, he would cling to it with hedonistic eagerness, trying to squeeze the last drop of life out of it. But the present holds promises and reaches out to the horizons of life, and this makes it possible for us to embrace our future as well as our past in the moment of celebration...The period before Christmas has that remarkable quality of joy that seems to touch not only Christians but all who live in our society...
But Advent is not only a period of joy. It is also a time when those who are lonely feel lonelier than during other periods of the year. During this time many people try to commit suicide or are hospitalized with severe depression. Those who have hope feel much joy and desire to give. Those who have no hope feel more depressed than ever and are often thrown back on their lonely selves in despair.
Surrounded by a loving, supportive community, Advent and Christmas seem pure joy. But let me not forget my lonely moments because it does not take much to make that loneliness reappear...When Jesus was loneliest, he gave most. That realization should help to deepen my commitment to service and let my desire to give become independent of my actual experience of joy. Only a deepening of my life in Christ will make that possible.
Henri Nouwen
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