Happy “Ordinary” Season!
After a few weeks of wishing friends “Merry Christmas” and then the oh-so-brief “season of Epiphany” … the time has come to put away the reds and greens, pack up the holiday dishes and take down the tree.
By now, most of us have already completed this task. Last Sunday, after all, was the last day of Christmas. We are now in the first week of Ordinary time.
Some may think of Ordinary time as “not-so-special” or “plain old weekdays” … but the Liturgical Calendar prompts us to use these days to count the weeks until the next season.
So, ordinary as in “ordinal” … it’s all about the numbers and keeping time.
In fact, I think we should start a movement – in the English-speaking world at least – to rename this “Ordinal Season.” Sounds funny, but it might work!
Strange how we obsess over time as humans.
We open our eyes each morning and check the clock (or these days, the cell phone’s digital clock) to determine if we have slept too long or have the luxury of rolling back over for a few extra winks.
We keep an eye on other numbers – the temperature, the channel on the TV, the radio, the timer on the coffee pot, the clock in the car. Some of us keep an eye on our ages (some of us would rather not think about it).
The Bible also pays attention to numbers: 7 days of creation, 3 persons of the Trinity, 40 days and 40 nights, 12 tribes and 12 apostles.
So here we are in the First Week in Ordinary time.
What do we do now?
Today’s readings provide us with a bit of a clue.
The first reading from The Letter to the Hebrews:
Take care, brothers and sisters, that none of you may have an evil and unfaithful heart, so as to forsake the living God. Encourage yourselves daily while it is still “today,” so that none of you may grow hardened by the deceit of sin. We have become partners of Christ if only we hold the beginning of the reality firm until the end.
Key phrase in this passage: Encourage yourselves daily while it is still today.
Working out our faith is a process. We have to take it one day at a time. We have to fight against our own temptations to avoid growing “hardened by the deceit of sin.”
Sin lies to us. It always will. We need to stiffen our resolve while also softening our hearts to the will of God.
And we need to do this daily.
What a thing to unravel and wrestle with over the next several weeks of Ordinary time!
These counted weeks – both the current group that will take us to Lent and Easter; and the next group that bridges us to Advent and Christmas – are the times where Mother Church helps us to focus on the mystery of Christ and the forgiveness of sins.
Rather than focus on His incarnation or the upcoming meditations on His suffering, death and resurrection, these Ordinary weeks are focused on the big picture. We should embrace them.
At the conclusion to the Christmas Season, we celebrated the Baptism of the Lord. In a sense, we put a ribbon on the Gift that we received and celebrated for 2 ½ weeks. Now is the time to take that Gift and venture out into the world, sharing Him along the way.
Ordinary time gives us what we need to embrace the whole story and to delve deeply into the Mystery of Christ and our salvation – to tie up more bows – so that we can adequately share this wonderful faith of ours with friends, family, neighbors and co-workers who may be wrapped up in their own “ordinary time” and in need of a little light in their lives.
We have a tradition in our home. Christmas gifts are opened and then immediately placed under the tree until the end of the Christmas Season. Then, when Ordinary time begins, we take down the trees, gather our gifts and begin to use them.
We wear our new sweaters. We set the time on our new watches. We take the fruitcake to work in hope someone will help us eat it. In other words, we proudly gather our gifts and make them a part of our lives.
Remembering that the best gift we received was in the form of a little child, we also make THAT a part of our lives.
Like that sweater, we put on Christ and wear Him to work.
And like that new watch, we begin to mark the time and count the weeks of this Ordinary – but not “plain old” time – of the Liturgical Calendar.
