We are coming to the end of another season as well: Ordinary Time. This long season finishes out the church’s calendar, and in a few weeks, Advent will begin a new liturgical year. “Advent’s darkness offers a womblike cocoon where we are invited to wait, to ponder what is gestating within us, and to hold expectancy for the glimmer of light on the horizon…[Winter] offers the gift of going inward. This is the time of year when many of God’s creatures are hibernating…in deep slumber to awaken in early spring and begin again…hungry for life and renewed by a long rest.” – Dana Reynolds, “Hibernating: An Advent Spiritual Practice” So, if you are the one about to be cocooned, to be in a dark and quiet process of transformation (with brand-new life at the end of it!), what do these next few weeks look like for you? Might this be a time to gather the gifts of this liturgical year, too? What has been its harvest, for you? What feasting might you do between now and Advent, to prepare for a slower time? How might you begin that process of slowing, even now, as you look toward that time? Are there things that you might even say “no” to, in order to make space for the sacred preparation and expectation that come with Advent? What are the "gifts of going inward" you are looking forward to?

Posted by Jamie Bonilla at 2021-10-22 13:49:10 UTC