The Sacred Amnesia
The Liturgical Traditions surrounding Advent have mystified me, in the truest sense of the word, for decades. Unfortunately, because they are wedded in most people’s minds to traditions proper to Christmas, it is difficult, unless true effort is made, to engage fully the lessons which Advent provides in abundance. One of these is that which I would like to call the Church’s ‘sacred amnesia’. In particular moments in the Church’s Liturgy, she always falls back to her most ancient roots, almost like a man who, stubbing his toe or beginning to pray, almost always curses or blesses exclusively in his native tongue. One thinks about The Reproaches of Good Friday, or the Kyrie said at every Mass. There is something in the Church’s Liturgical psyche, so to speak, which makes use of her most ancient texts and stories in order to express her most fundamental longings. Whether that is for union with God, desire for forgiveness, or even the silence of adoration, we seek signs and words which will help us to process sacred sentiment.
What I find most interesting about these nights which end the Advent Season, which contain the famous “O Antiphons”, is that the Church time-travels. It is almost as if she forgets that Christ has already come in the flesh, and at this time of the year, she addresses Christ most poignantly, not with the titles of the Gospels or the Apostolic Writings, but in the obscurity and mystery of prophecy. This is even true in the Old Rite, which proclaimed at length at Christmas Eve especially the prophecies of the coming of the Christ. Even now we do this, as the Gospel for December 17th is the genealogy of Matthew. We count not only the days to Christmas, but the generations, even the eons which passed in melancholy before he came to us in grace and truth, for “long lay the world, in sin and error pining”. We think it a great thing that 2,000 years has now passed since the Nativity of the Lord Jesus according to the flesh, but far more passed, with the human race in far greater obscurity, than we can even conceive.
Even as recently as late November 2019, archaeologists announced the discovery of children who literally ‘wore’ the skulls of other children as helmets. This grisly find ought to remind us how comparatively good are the times in which we live, and to what depths our unaided nature can sink. And yet Jesus came. This visit of his was absolutely unmerited, granted our own depravity. Not even the best of our fallen nature can, or ever could, perfectly please him. And yet it pleased him to come, so that we would be made pleasing to him by his coming.
Memory, as we understand it, is one of the core elements of having a consistent personality, and self-image. The Church, in reaching back to this pre-Incarnational darkness, reminds us that God did not leave himself without witnesses, and so the testimony of the Law and the Prophets, as well as the oracles of the pagans (like that of Balaam), help us to recall how far back in our history the divine hand has again and again been extended. The fact that unknown and countless generations passed since the creation of the human race and the coming even of Moses should give us pause to think what a tremendous mystery is that of God’s Providence. And what is it now then, to be born in these times, to have received Holy Baptism and the Divine Sacraments, and to have heard the Gospel proclaimed? We are beyond blessed, when compared to the shadows and darkness in which our ancestors groped for God, and for meaning. God gave us breadcrumbs, so to speak, or little points of light, to guide us to the crib of Bethlehem. These last few days of Advent, we turn to the prophecies our ancestors heard in mystery, in order to recapture something of their power.
It is always darkest before the dawn. As we navigate truly dark times as we await the Second Coming of Our Savior, newly instructed in the lessons of Advent, we have a great opportunity once again to arm ourselves with hope. It is through that virtue that the Old Testament saints and righteous pagans pursued God. I think those men and women would envy our lot today in some ways. We have more advantages than they could even dream of. How privileged we are!
