O Radiant Dawn, splendor of light everlasting:
Come
and enlighten those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.
Every year
when I pray the O Antiphons I can't help but notice that the Antiphon focuses
on the 'splendor of light everlasting' falls on the shortest and darkest day of
the year (for those of us in the northern hemisphere). It is a time when the
"winter's cold ambush descends on us...Darkness arrives; all is anonymous,
the sun has gone and the fading year dies."*
For all of us,
the arrival of 'darkness' can take on different meanings. Just this past weekend Teresa and I were back
in her hometown to celebrate her Dad's 89th birthday. But when the cake came out, although he
smiled at all who gathered, he was unaware of what to do with the burning
candles. Meanwhile, just the other day, I received a call from my step-mom,
repeating the conversation we had the day before, and asking me if she had
given birth to any children of her own that she needs to remember this
Christmas. For them, and for so many
others, darkness has arrived and much of life is anonymous.
So where is
the darkness in your life? How often have you felt 'ambushed'?
But we have
reason to 'come and cheer' the spirit of Advent…for the waiting and hoping is
near an end. For while, on this winter
equinox, we celebrate that the sun equally illuminates both the northern and
southern hemispheres...we hold to the fact that tomorrow will be brighter than
today.
This fifth day
of the O Antiphons reminds us that Christ is the Light that will 'disperse the
gloomy clouds' and put an end to 'death's dark shadows'...the Light that will
make the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk...the Light that will enfold
all of the dark nights of our life.
O come, Thou Day-spring, come and cheer
Our spirits by Thine advent here;
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
*
taken from: Sonnet for the Winter
Solstice, Robert Rose
