Advent Musings

My dear college friend Phil wanted me to be an artist. No, I insisted, I was a history major (which I loved) doing the practical thing (following my father): doing the business thing. Art was an extra, an extravagance, a luxury.  And I was happy doing things that way for quite a few years. And then I had an early mid-life epiphany and found that I was called to ordained ministry. It all seemed just right. Except I had left something behind.

Some years ago, I remembered Phil's words and through a series of happy accidents re-discovered a part of myself that I had forgotten; the creative part. And soon after that, I began to hang some of my own art work in my own home. This helps me to remember the life that the creative process brings. The time I spend doing my art has the same timeless dimension as the time I spend in contemplative prayer: the qualities are the same.

What are those qualities?  The time seems sometimes to simply melt away; where have the hours gone? Sometimes the time is not enough, I crave more time but cannot take it. Sometimes the time is a wrestling time: I can't settle down, clear my mind, forget about that certain vexing thing that keeps poking at me, the burr under my saddle. The time is unpredictable but always rich, always bearing fruit. It is growing time.

And so I enter this Advent (whoops, in the second week already!)  praying this for the world, and for my friends and my family and my parishioners and for myself. A greening, growing time, a time of immense possibility in the midst of immense chaos and confusion. A time when hope may be high. Or is it that perhaps the only thing we can hope for is hope: pray for hope. But it is also a time for right action and right thinking and right praying. I'm thinking that more art, more praying in that way, needs to be in my future.  Does more creativity need to be in your Advent?