As I’m writing this, it’s currently the last Friday of Advent. To most in the world, the Christmas season was about to end, and thank goodness for that! The tree, if it’s real, was becoming more and more concerning as it dried out.
The cookies would soon be broken and stale at the bottom of the jar. Parents everywhere were ready to cry if they must listen to “Jingle Bells, Batman Smells” one more time. Clothes were getting tighter, and the budget went out the window. The wrapping paper would be torn off the gifts, the dinner would be congealing on the platter, and moms everywhere would breathe a sigh of relief.
Christmas is over and it’s time to move on with regularly scheduled life. Seasonal Affective Disorder waits in the wings to carry us through to April. What a bleak picture!
But the world has it all wrong. The celebration isn’t over. The Christ Child has come! Let me say that again: the Christ Child has come! Why would we stop celebrating when the Child was just born? Does a new parent stop proclaiming the joy of a new baby when the child is born? Of course not!
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Christmas is just beginning. For centuries, Christians spent Advent in fasting and penance, slowly anticipating the coming of Emmanuel, God with us. Advent is a mini-Lent as we reset our hearts and prepare room for Jesus. Traditionally, Christmas Day was the beginning of 12 days of feasting and celebrating the Word made flesh, dwelling among us.
The 12 Days of Christmas come after, not before Christmas, and last until Jan. 6, the feast of Epiphany, when the church celebrates the arrival of the Wise Men. We continue to celebrate until Feb. 2, with the feast of the Presentation of the Child Jesus in the Temple.
Why does Christmas continue until then? How do we know the second of February is when Jesus would have been presented at the Temple? The date isn’t pulled out of thin air. We see in Leviticus 12 that a woman who births a male child cannot enter the Temple for 40 days until her purifying is complete.
Then in Leviticus 12:6 we read, “When the days of her purifying are completed, whether for a son or a daughter, she shall bring to the priest at the door of the tent of meeting a lamb a year old for a burnt offering, and a young pigeon or a turtle dove for a sin offering.” Forty days from Christmas is the second of February.
During these 40 days of purification, the Blessed Virgin would have been resting and caring for the newborn Jesus, counting God’s toes in wonder, looking into God’s human eyes, holding the Creator of the world close to her heart.
Joseph would have been wrapping the Christ Child in blankets, in awe that he was the stepfather of the Incarnation. The shepherds would still have been talking about the angels singing in the field and the Babe lying in the manger.
So as the rest of the world vacuums up pine needles and wonders where to put everything, let us continue the celebration. Let us sit in wonderment with Mary and hold the Baby Jesus, the very Word of God who put on flesh, close to our hearts.
Let us ponder in our hearts that God became man to save us from darkness and set us free, humbling himself in human form to the point of death for love of us. (Philippians 2:6-8). This Christmas season, let us rest with the Holy Family while we adore the tiny Baby Jesus.
Hope, peace and grace to you.
Brandi Skidmore, now of Indiana, is the former vice president of the Ladies Altar Society at Our Lady of the Lake Catholic Church at Lake Village, Ark.
Editor’s note: Pastors, ministers or other writers interested in writing for this section may submit articles for consideration to shope@adgnewsroom.com. Writers should have connections to Southeast Arkansas. Please include your name, phone number and the name and location of your church or ministry.