We had three Christmas Eve Masses and one Christmas morning Mass. Before Christmas, the combined choirs had a concert, one of the year’s highlights in our parish, St. Augustine in Philadelphia. There also were innumerable parties. All the preparation and the actual decorating of the church and many other details, just like every other parish, had to be arranged. We make the Sacrament of Reconciliation available after each of our Masses. I needed to buy some Christmas presents that I gave to family and friends. (I don’t send Christmas cards). I have a pile of thank-you notes to write. It is Christmas afternoon and I join my family for Christmas dinner. I hear the Christmas music (which I heard on the radio since Halloween), and even though as far as the Church is concerned the Christmas season has just begun, I feel anything but in the Christmas spirit. Hearing “O Holy Night” and “Joy to the World” just do not resonate.

Now it is the day after Christmas and we are in the Christmas Octave. Is it a glorious season? I see the Christmas trees on the curbs waiting to be picked up by the sanitation workers and am getting advertisements in the mail for Lenten ideas. I can’t even hear Christmas music on the radio. They are getting ready for Valentine’s Day. I want to scream, “Please stop, I just want to enjoy Christmas. It just began.”

Changing the Approach

This has been my experience in the past, but I have tried to change my approach in order to have a glorious Christmas season. What helps me to have the Christmas spirit, a glorious season, when I am exhausted and, culturally, Christmas is over? It may sound overly simplistic, but I try to have a good Advent. I try not to get sucked into secular society’s saying the Christmas season begins at Thanksgiving and ends on Christmas Day. I try to take advantage of the spirituality of Advent.

This past Advent, my spiritual director suggested I reflect on “The Coming of God” (Hymns Ancient and Modern Ltd, $23.99) by Sister Maria Boulding. It very much helped me stay in the Advent season reflecting on how for many centuries the Israelites were waiting and waiting. It helped me identify that my life is, like the Israelites, one of hoping and longing for the second coming of Jesus. My whole life is an Advent. It helped me reflect on how Mary was powerless and poor but faithfully waited, how the noisy world has little time to listen and wait, and that I did not want to get caught up in that. It helped me stay in the Advent season.

Of course, the spirituality of Advent is more than reading a book. Amid all the craziness, it is also keeping the basics going: reflecting on Advent readings, sharing Scripture with others, getting to confession, etc. This all helps to set a tone of looking forward to celebrating Christmas and not looking forward to, “Oh, thank God that is over,” which is how I would feel if I had been celebrating Christmas for the past four weeks or more.

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Proper Forms of the Communicantes

On the Nativity of the Lord and throughout the Christmas Octave the priest uses the following with the first Eucharistic prayer: “Celebrating the most sacred night (day) on which blessed Mary the immaculate Virgin brought forth the Savior for this world, and in communion with those whose memory we venerate, especially the glorious ever-Virgin Mary, Mother of our God and Lord, Jesus Christ …” — Roman Missal, Eucharistic Prayer 1

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Notice, I did not reflect, above, on the “Christmas concert” or “Christmas parties,” because I try to tell our parishioners that we are not in the Christmas season until Christmas Eve. This is really countercultural. Instead, we call them pre-Christmas concerts and pre-Christmas parties. I would love to wait (what Advent is all about) to have these things after Dec. 25, but that is an uphill battle. Trying to make the distinction between a Christmas and a pre-Christmas party may sound like semantics, but it sets a tone, at least in my head, and I think it gives a message to others as well.

Taking Downtime

How about Dec. 26? How do I stay focused on Christmas spirituality? I think first I must acknowledge I am exhausted and then find some downtime and not feel guilty about it. Jesus did that. “Jacob’s well was there. Jesus, tired from his journey, sat down there at the well. It was about noon” (Jn 4:6).

Jesus told the apostles to take some downtime: “The apostles gathered together with Jesus and reported all they had done and taught. He said to them, ‘Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.’ People were coming and going in great numbers, and they had no opportunity even to eat” (Mk 6:30-31). Not to rest is counterproductive.

This past Christmas season, I made it a point after Christmas to make four “Christmas visits” to some relatives and friends I have not seen for a while, some a two-to-three-hour distance, which helped with my Christmas spirit.

But what really helps me keep the spirit of Christmas after Dec. 25? The answer for me is to not celebrate Christmas before Dec. 25. What helps me to have a glorious Christmas season, even when exhausted, is to truly celebrate Advent.

FATHER BILL WATERS, OSA, is the pastor of St. Augustine Parish in Philadelphia.

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Concrete Commitments during Advent

Pope Francis, in his Angelus address on Dec. 21, 2021, suggested what he believes is an effective approach to make Advent a preparatory time for Christmas. The pope said: “How can I do my part? Let us make a concrete commitment, even if small, that is adapted to our situation in life, and let us continue to do it to prepare ourselves for this Christmas. For example: I can call a person who is alone, visit that elderly person or that person who is ill, do something to serve a poor person, someone in need. Even still: Maybe I need to ask forgiveness, grant forgiveness, clarify a situation, pay a debt. Perhaps I have neglected prayer and after a long time it is time to draw near to the Lord’s forgiveness. Brothers and sisters, let us find something concrete and do it!”

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