I didn’t much like being engaged.
Don’t get me wrong:
I was thrilled at the prospect
of Maureen becoming my wife.
And it wasn’t even that I disliked having to make
all the preparations necessary for the wedding
(particularly since I skipped off to Germany
for the last couple of months before the event,
leaving Maureen, as usual,
to do the final heavy lifting).
What I disliked
was that we had decided to marry
and the hour of our wedding had been set—
an hour that I was awaiting
with equal parts anticipation and anxiety—
and yet nothing that I could do
would speed up its arrival.
If anything, my anticipation and anxiety
seemed to make time pass more slowly.
Don’t get me wrong:
I was thrilled at the prospect
of Maureen becoming my wife.
And it wasn’t even that I disliked having to make
all the preparations necessary for the wedding
(particularly since I skipped off to Germany
for the last couple of months before the event,
leaving Maureen, as usual,
to do the final heavy lifting).
What I disliked
was that we had decided to marry
and the hour of our wedding had been set—
an hour that I was awaiting
with equal parts anticipation and anxiety—
and yet nothing that I could do
would speed up its arrival.
If anything, my anticipation and anxiety
seemed to make time pass more slowly.
I imagine that couple
whose wedding took place
at Cana of Galilee many years ago
felt the same way:
they too awaited that hour
with anticipation and anxiety,
making their plans
and gathering their goods
(apparently not enough,
at least when it came to the wine),
and yet unable to do the one thing
that they would most like to do:
speed the arrival of that hour
and so be freed
of their anxious anticipation.
whose wedding took place
at Cana of Galilee many years ago
felt the same way:
they too awaited that hour
with anticipation and anxiety,
making their plans
and gathering their goods
(apparently not enough,
at least when it came to the wine),
and yet unable to do the one thing
that they would most like to do:
speed the arrival of that hour
and so be freed
of their anxious anticipation.
But they were not the only ones
awaiting an hour.
Jesus too speaks of “my hour,”
which “has not yet come.”
In John’s Gospel, Jesus speaks
again and again of his appointed hour:
the hour when the Father glorifies the Son
so that the Son may glorify the Father (17:1);
the hour for him “to depart from this world
and go to the Father” (13:1);
the hour of his dying and rising.
Like someone anxiously awaiting his wedding day,
it seems that Jesus too must suffer the passage of time,
must be subjected to time’s slow passage
as he waits for the appointed hour.
In Luke’s Gospel (12:49-50) Jesus says,
“I have come to set the earth on fire,
and how I wish it were already blazing!
There is a baptism with which I must be baptized,
and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!”
Events are in motion;
Jesus is moving toward his hour;
but only at the pace that time will allow.
awaiting an hour.
Jesus too speaks of “my hour,”
which “has not yet come.”
In John’s Gospel, Jesus speaks
again and again of his appointed hour:
the hour when the Father glorifies the Son
so that the Son may glorify the Father (17:1);
the hour for him “to depart from this world
and go to the Father” (13:1);
the hour of his dying and rising.
Like someone anxiously awaiting his wedding day,
it seems that Jesus too must suffer the passage of time,
must be subjected to time’s slow passage
as he waits for the appointed hour.
In Luke’s Gospel (12:49-50) Jesus says,
“I have come to set the earth on fire,
and how I wish it were already blazing!
There is a baptism with which I must be baptized,
and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished!”
Events are in motion;
Jesus is moving toward his hour;
but only at the pace that time will allow.
But is he not the eternal Word of the Father,
without whom nothing was made?
Is he not the one who,
in the beginning,
created time itself?
We pray in one of our eucharistic Prefaces,
“you laid the foundations of the world
and have arranged the changing
of times and seasons.”
In his creating Word, God has decreed
the unfolding of our lives
over the course of time:
this is a condition of being a creature
subject to God’s providence.
But surely the Word, who contains
every instant of time enfolded within himself,
does not need to wait for time to unfold,
does not need to wait for his hour to arrive.
without whom nothing was made?
Is he not the one who,
in the beginning,
created time itself?
We pray in one of our eucharistic Prefaces,
“you laid the foundations of the world
and have arranged the changing
of times and seasons.”
In his creating Word, God has decreed
the unfolding of our lives
over the course of time:
this is a condition of being a creature
subject to God’s providence.
But surely the Word, who contains
every instant of time enfolded within himself,
does not need to wait for time to unfold,
does not need to wait for his hour to arrive.
He does not need to, but he chooses to.
This is the mystery we have just celebrated
in the joyful Christmas season,
but which we continue to celebrate
in the slowly unfolding
of the ordinary time of our lives.
The God who arranges
the changing of times and season
wills to become subject
to the times he has arranged;
the timeless Word of God
joins us in our waiting
for what time will bring,
joins us in our journey to our hour.
This is the mystery we have just celebrated
in the joyful Christmas season,
but which we continue to celebrate
in the slowly unfolding
of the ordinary time of our lives.
The God who arranges
the changing of times and season
wills to become subject
to the times he has arranged;
the timeless Word of God
joins us in our waiting
for what time will bring,
joins us in our journey to our hour.
God in Christ inhabits time.
But Jesus inhabits time differently from us.
For us, the slow journey to our hour
can become a time of frustration,
as anticipation lapses into anguished anxiety.
Time masters us and makes us its slave
as we try to master it and control its flow.
But Jesus is not enslaved by time,
because he embraces this journey
to his hour that is to come
as the mission that has been
given to him by his Father.
For this reason,
even in the midst
of anguish and anxiety,
his journey to the hour
when he will be glorified
in cross and resurrection
becomes itself the time
for God’s glory to manifest itself.
The glory of the hour he awaits
seeps into the passage of time itself
and transforms it.
His hour has not yet come,
but in the signs and wonders that he works
we begin to catch the light of eternal glory.
Jesus inhabits time differently from us,
and he invites us to let
the shining forth of his glory
transform the way
that we inhabit time
into something like the way
that he inhabits time.
the mission that we have been given in him,
the mission that is unique to each one of us,
according to the gifts
that the one Spirit has given to us.
To embrace our lives as divine mission
is to be freed from time’s slavery,
to be freed from anxious anticipation
of what might come,
and to enjoy even now
some share in that glory
that we call life eternal.
and he invites us to let
the shining forth of his glory
transform the way
that we inhabit time
into something like the way
that he inhabits time.
As St. Paul writes to the Thessalonians,
“God has called us through the Gospel
to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Christ invites us to embrace
in the ordinary unfolding of our livesthe mission that we have been given in him,
the mission that is unique to each one of us,
according to the gifts
that the one Spirit has given to us.
To embrace our lives as divine mission
is to be freed from time’s slavery,
to be freed from anxious anticipation
of what might come,
and to enjoy even now
some share in that glory
that we call life eternal.
This freedom is offered to us
freely in Christ;
let us pray that we will have the grace
to receive the gift of his glory,
so that our time might be redeemed
and that God, who is merciful,
might have mercy on us all.
freely in Christ;
let us pray that we will have the grace
to receive the gift of his glory,
so that our time might be redeemed
and that God, who is merciful,
might have mercy on us all.
