ADVENT THEME 1.

You can't sleep. Just when you feel you are about to drop off, a random thought rouses you again. Eventually, you call out into the darkness, "what time is it, Love?" But "Love" does not answer.

Then you remember that there cannot be an answer, not now or ever again, for the other half of your marriage bed is empty and will go on being empty into the future. For whatever reason, "Love" will not return. Suddenly, not just your bedroom, but your whole life feels empty.

As you become more aware of your loneliness a ghost enters your room, not the ghost of someone you have known and loved and called by name, but a ghost who would rather you did not know its name. This ghost does not love you. It comes first to deceive and then to destroy. Beware of this ghost. It is the ghost of self- pity.

Advent asks us to become more aware of time; time that wags a finger in warning, even as it beckons us forward in hope.

Advent fills us with promise, and then, so that this hope is not wasted on us, Advent also offers us words of caution.

Advent reminds us of Time in all its phases. Advent speaks of vision and days to come and of days that are now here. Advent chastises us for the waste of Time and enlivens us with its promise.

Above all Advent reminds us, not of clock or calendar or the daily routine of life, but of the hand that first gave us the gift of Time. He gave it to us without letting go of it. It acts now like an umbilical cord forever connecting he who gives with those who receive.

Once we accept time as a gift from the hand of the Giver, the ghost of self-pity runs away from us. In the company of Times' giver, we are never alone. Once we accept Time as a gift, Love will always answer.