Tempus Adventus...

Tomorrow is the First Sunday of Advent, which I am especially pleased about. ''Time after Pentecost'' gets a bit ''samey'' after so many weeks, and Advent is one of my favourite Seasons of the Liturgical Year. I simply adore Christmas, liturgically mind you, and in the theology of the Church - the whole apostate and meaningless ''festive season'' just fills me with wrath; especially since one is now expected, ritual requires it, to buy presents for people etc. Now, I enjoy buying things for people, because I like to make people happy and feel special, but I prefer to buy things spontaneously and of my own volition, not because I am expected to as a matter of principle. So far I have brought only one Christmas present, for my father (which was, despite the 65% off, more than I could afford), and buying for my mother is impossible. She is the sort of woman who tells you she likes something, then when you buy it for her changes her mind; or you buy something that you think is nice and she hates it. Buying presents for people is especially hard for someone like me, since I can't be expected to know fully what people like - I am genuinely not interested in the whims or private tastes of people - but saying this to most people, and pretty much everything else which I have written so far, only makes people think that you hate Christmas. I know I won't get what I really want...perhaps, though, it is enough to just watch and wait for the coming of Our Lord and at Midnight of Christmas Day to simply think about the dual significance of Christmas - the humility of the Christ-child, as frail as any newborn baby, and just as adorable, but also the immensity of His Majesty declared by the voices of the Angelic host, singing:

Gloria in Excelsis Deo, et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis.

The above photo has nothing to do with Advent liturgically, it just depicts the dawn seen over the leagues of the Sea. One thing from Tolkien that rather reminds me of Advent, or Christmas, is the first Dawn of the Sun seen from Beleriand by the Woodland Elves. In Book III of The Lord of the Rings, there is a delicious description of Merry and Pippin looking out from the woods at the battle between the Men of Rohan and the Uruk-hai. Tolkien says: ''Out of the shadows the hobbits peeped, gazing back down the slope: little furtive figures that in the dim light looked like elf-children in the deeps of time peering out of the Wild Wood in wonder at their first Dawn.'' At the first light of the Sun, the horns rang, and the Orcs were defeated. This may or may not be resonant with most people, but I think it is a nice simile - Advent, dawns, beginnings, new hope etc.