I am delighted to be with you at St. Hilda’s this morning. What a pleasure to meet Bishop Jim in person; to see that you are in good hands and I am now looking toward a new future as you all walk together. I am grateful to all of you for your ministry here over many years. I am appreciative of the many ways that you have lived out the gospel of Christ in this place and spread that into the surrounding neighbourhood.
November 25, so just a few days ago was the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. It seems horrible to me that we need such a day but the United Nations reminds that every ten minutes, one woman or girl is killed by their intimate partner or family. Every ten minutes. I am sorry to begin my sermon in such a way; with such heavy and troubling words but clearly we need to bring such things to light and not keep these facts hidden or ignored.
Here in Canada, on December 6, so in less than a week’s time, people will gather all across the country to pay tribute and to remember and honour 14 women who were killed at the engineering school of Polytechnique Montreal. Many will hold candles and consider the names of the 14 young, capable scientists and scholars whose lives were ended abruptly by a shooter’s rampage. The event took place 36 years ago this year but still we remember the horror and injustice of what took place. And again we are reminded that women all across the country and in so many parts of the globe face discrimination, violence, misogyny, and stolen opportunities as we consider what it means to be a society based on equal freedoms and equal rights. We continue to fail to make the mark… but in a few days women and men will hold candles observing a light in the darkness that we need to keep visible and clear. Signs of hope despite many things taking place in the world of our times. The president of Polytechnique Montreal, Maude Cohen, offered these words last year on the 35th anniversary and on continuing to hold the memorials: “It’s about making sure that everyone, women specifically on December 6, can feel welcome, they can feel like they can blossom and they can really enjoy a place where they can fulfil their dreams.” And so candles will be in hand to try and push back some of the darkness, push back some of the grief, push back the violence and make room for hope.
For we need hope, on some of the most difficult of days, we need hope… actually on every day that we walk in this world, we need it to carry us and walk with us. We need to know of that light and hear the invitation to be bearers of that light and bring it into the places it is most desperately needed. And that is also what we are doing here this morning as well.
We have lit the first of the candles on our Advent wreath. This candle, marks the start of the Church’s year, a visible symbol of the beginning of the season of Advent, a time of preparation and anticipation that Jesus will come to us, that Jesus is with us. It is a sign of pushing back the darkness of this world.
Advent is our time in the Church, to slow down the rush to move quickly into the season of Christmas and the decorations and the baking and the festivities. The season of Advent is much more measured and whispers to us to pause and recognize that this season is part of our spiritual journey. A time for feeding our soul, rethinking who this Jesus really was, is and is to come. This Advent time is about recognizing the holiness of all of life.
Jesus described this as staying awake, a great image… staying awake to God amongst us, even amongst us. Isaiah described it as a whole new understanding of the world where swords are beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks and nation not learning war anymore. It is a complete rethinking about priorities, hopes, dreams, purpose of life and the importance of love. It is about seeing that at the beginning of time God came to us and continues to come to us to open our eyes, to awaken us to see the incredible gift of grace given to us and offered to us as an invitation that we would live it and share it. Put on the Lord Jesus Christ were Paul’s words in the letter to the Romans and that is what we do in this season of Advent.
Joan Chittister phrases it this way: “The function of Advent is to remind us what we’re waiting for as we go through life too busy with things that do not matter to remember the things that do…. Advent relieves us of our commitment to the frenetic in a fast-paced world. It slows us down. It makes us think. It makes us look beyond today to the ‘great tomorrow’ of life. Without Advent, moved only by the race to nowhere that exhausts the world around us, we could be so frantic with trying to consume and control this life that we fail to develop within ourselves a taste for the spirit that does not die and will not slip through our fingers like melted snow.”
And so, around the world people named a day to end violence against women. A day seeking to shed light on something often hidden in the darkness. Bringing to the light what must be exposed for what it is.
And so, a group of people, many of whom probably won’t know each other, but they will gather at Polytechnique Montreal where a person with a gun arrived with a most evil intent. And that group of people will hold candles in their hands to name very clearly that life needs to be different. That hope needs to abound. That love conquers evil. That those who died did not die in vain but will be remembered.
And so, just recently groups of people gathered in places all around the world because of a massive convention taking place in Belem, Brazil. With candles in hand, people in so many corners of this planet congregated and prayed for the gathering of COP30. It was to be a convention to look at a global response to the climate emergency, to reduce the impact that we are having on the earth and the continuing destruction of the planet. With candles in hand, they ensured that world leaders knew that many were paying attention and that a resolution with some clear direction and purpose needed to be formed, that life needs to be different. That hope needs to abound. That love conquers evil. That we can come together to stand up for this planet and the future.
As violence continues in Gaza despite the hope of a ceasefire. As the United Nations warns of continuing starvation and lack of shelter and lack of medical supplies for Palestinian people, many continue to hold vigils. People carry candles in their hands, they march, they sing, they stand in unity with those who are being bombed and destroyed in this tiny Gaza strip. And so groups of people hold candles to name very clearly that life needs to be different. That hope needs to abound. That love conquers evil. That our world is aching for peace not more conflict, that indeed there should be more plowshares and pruning hooks.
And I could go on for a long time with vigils for Indigenous women and girls, for the people of Sudan and Ukraine, for fatal drug overdoses in this province and the housing and homelessness problem in this area. In all these cases and many others, people carry candles as a sign of pushing back darkness and inviting in hope. Urging hope to be present.
And that is what we are doing today as well. Huddling around this candle, if you will, this first candle of Advent, the candle of hope. We gather and despite all that is taking place in the world we are inviting God to send us hope, to bring us peace, to open our eyes to holy presence even amongst us, even now, even here. Jesus said, “Keep awake, therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.” We have lit the first Advent Candle on our wreath to mark our vigil, our keeping awake, for the coming of Christ as our source of hope. We have lit the first candle to name our concerns about this world and to affirm that there is a better way. To affirm that we believe that God is calling us to more. To affirm that Advent is a time to awaken ourselves to see that indeed God is in our midst and is calling us to recognize God’s presence in the beauty of this world, in the grieving, in the addicted, in those who are praying and holding vigil. To see that God has not left us abandoned but has promised to be with us always… always. We are called to stay awake, awake to God’s voice, awake to God’s presence in this time of watching once again for the day when the world rejoices that the line between us and God has been erased so that indeed hope is seen and known.
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(photo: Kalisa Veer/ Unsplash)