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Click here to listen to this homily.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n One way to think about Advent\u2014so said St. Bernard of Clairvaux once\u2014is to think about what it\u2019s like to drown.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n His, of course, was almost entirely a different Christianity from ours, as was the faith of most of our forebears. To think of Advent as the stuff of chocolate calendars, colored candles, or lovely music, or even to think of it as a time of spiritual rest and renewal, as we do now, is not immediately how our ancestors would have conceived it. Theirs, as I have said often before, was a more sober and surely less sentimental Christianity, a harder faith in many ways. We get a sense of this sometimes, the difference between then and now. It seems strange to us, for instance, even inappropriate some would say, to evoke the image Bernard does\u2014the image of a person drowning\u2014to talk about Advent. It is indeed a strange and shocking way to think about it, but it made perfect sense to him. Though it is odd to us. Yet, still, it\u2019s not clear to me who understands Advent better, our ancients or we moderns. For I think we\u2019re missing something too, we comfortable, sentimental Christians with our softer Advents. Something important.<\/p>\n The way St. Bernard put it was this: \u201cAdam\u2019s unhappy children, having left aside activities that are true and bring salvation, seek instead what is fleeting and ephemeral.\u201d Desires misdirected, we flail about, always chasing after the wrong things. In that sense, Bernard said, we are indeed drowning in the world, unable to grab hold of what can truly save us, too ignorant even to know what truly saves. \u201cYou see them,\u201d Bernard said, \u201cclinging tenaciously to whatever first comes to hand, refusing to let go for any reason, whatever it may be, even though it can do them no good at all.\u201d[1]<\/a> This is us, St. Bernard said: souls drowning in the world, clinging to all the wrong things, thinking all these wrong things will save us from drowning. \u201cSave me, O God: for the waters are come in, even unto my soul.\u201d[2]<\/a> That\u2019s how to think about Advent, he said. That\u2019s how to think about the advent of the word of God: to realize we are drowning in the world, grabbing at all the wrong things, things that in the end will not save us at all. Because, of course, only the Word can save us\u2014the Christ whose coming we\u2019re called to contemplate.<\/p>\n It does seem a better way to think about it, a truer way to consider it. It does seem a more accurate description, not just of the human circumstance in general, but particularly, of the modern circumstance. I can\u2019t help but think of all those things we seek when seeking peace for our souls, peace for our worn-out minds and bodies too. Especially this year. What\u2019s come to the fore\u2014at least for some\u2014is something like existential angst: the natural order, the political regime, the Church, the economic order\u2014all of it\u2014seems now strangely unstable, as if the foundations are being destroyed. And thus, naturally, we look for stability, at least for some shelter, some little obscure hovel of protection. Now this makes sense at one level, the bodily level; in fact, at this level it\u2019s a very smart thing to do\u2014to look for work, for food and shelter. But, of course, we look for more than that, don\u2019t we? We need more than that, don\u2019t we? We don\u2019t hoard toilet paper, for example, just because we need it, do we? There\u2019s something else going on there, some deeper longing at work.<\/p>\n This is where we moderns begin to talk about things like \u201cwell-being\u201d and \u201cmental health,\u201d which is a good thing to talk about; it\u2019s just that we should realize we\u2019re wandering the same psychological deserts our ancestors trekked; and in many respects, they fared better. This also is where we begin to use words like \u201cmeaning,\u201d whatever that means; this is where people also talk about \u201cmindfulness.\u201d This is where you\u2019ll find an entire industry of selectively curated and deconstructed religious practices rendered palatable for people like us and pushed upon us by our celebrities or your company\u2019s insurance provider; the philosopher Slavoj \u017di\u017eek called this phenomenon \u201cWestern Buddhism,\u201d and it\u2019s an accurate description of all this.[3]<\/a> It is what so many of us seek\u2014some book, some method, some meme, some meditation some pop singer swears by. And, of course, there\u2019s nothing immediately bad about this; in fact, some of it\u2019s quite good. It\u2019s just that you should know that all of this is nothing other than the search for God. Your better masters here would be the saints not celebrities, monks not sociologists and journalists.<\/p>\n It\u2019s certainly better than those other deadly things which so many people seek to make sense of this strange world. Better certainly than the strange and dangerous way so many of us have made politics too important to our lives. It was Jacques Ellul who said decades ago that it was the politicization of society, with its sloganized rhetoric, that was like a \u201cdrug insidiously slipped into our consciousness;\u201d and of course, he was right.[4]<\/a> Too many of us search in vain for something like salvation, some sort of religious victory, whether atheist or pious, in politics. There is something deranged in how we\u2019ve come to think about it; it is a false search.<\/p>\n But, of course, even this is better than what has ruined so many others. Those old customary demons of drink, of drugs, of pornography. If bad politics makes us like demons, these render us subhuman. Here our pleasures are ruined; in this we search and search for a more and more elusive high until there is nothing left, nothing left of body and soul so often too. This, friends, is a pandemic too. But still, the function is the same: all of this too is a false search for love and ultimately God.<\/p>\n It is the seeking of that which your soul knows it needs, which it was created to need, but of which you may be tragically ignorant. If so, like so many others, you grasp pathetically for whatever you can think of to make it all make sense. Even if you know it won\u2019t do anything for you\u2014just give you a little warmth from the cold for the briefest moment, a fleeting high or a small, silly taste of temporary victory\u2014still you chase after it. One could say it\u2019s a bit like drowning. It is very much like drowning\u2014all of it but the broken search for God, pathetically grasping for all that does not save. Perhaps we can begin to understand what St. Bernard was on about, preaching about Advent and drowning. He was, you see, a real preacher. His Christianity was real.<\/p>\n When Jesus began to preach beside the sea, before he spoke of the word of God like it was seed seeking good soil, he said simply, \u201cListen.\u201d[5]<\/a> In today\u2019s gospel, he simply says, \u201cWatch!\u201d[6]<\/a> And this, really, is all the Church wants us to remember at the start of this Advent\u2014Listen<\/em> and Watch<\/em>. We are, with all due respect, like people drowning. We are drowning in the world, drowning in the noise of all the world. And it\u2019s difficult to know where to go and what to seek. There are so many false paths, dead ends, and dangerous byways. Even among Christians there are many false paths; this, of course, is nothing new. Paul warned of such things; as St. Irenaeus wrote, \u201cSome persons reject the truth.\u201d[7]<\/a> And some go on to preach falsehood; some sell it on Twitter. It is indeed hard to know sometimes where to turn. Listen <\/em>and Watch<\/em>\u2014but how?<\/p>\n That\u2019s the question of Advent, the question of life, really. I\u2019m talking about the more urgent advent, what St. Bernard called the \u201cspiritual and hidden\u201d advent, the advent of the lover of your soul; that other final advent, which some will find terrible, we really can do nothing about it; it\u2019s coming no matter what.[8]<\/a> But for this advent, the advent of Christ, his coming into your soul, for that you really should try to listen and watch. You are very near to where he speaks, but you must listen and watch. Do you know how? Try to learn how. Silently. Amen<\/em>.<\/p>\n [1]<\/a> St. Bernard of Clairvaux, \u201cSermon One: On the Six Aspects of Advent,\u201d Sermons for the Advent and the Christmas Season<\/em> 1<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Psalm 69:1 (Coverdale)<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Slavoj \u017di\u017eek, On Belief<\/em>, 12-15<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> Jacques Ellul, The Political Illusion<\/em>, 239<\/p>\n [5]<\/a> Mark 4:3<\/p>\n [6]<\/a> Mark 13:37<\/p>\n [7]<\/a> Galatians 1:6-9; St. Irenaeus of Lyon, Against Heresies<\/em>, pr. 1<\/p>\n