Welcome to Ordinary Time.
(Whatever that is.)
According to the Church calendar that helps to organize and direct the worship life of the Church Universal, there are several seasons in a year. The new year begins not on January 1, but rather with the first Sunday of Advent. To commemorate this four-week period, the Church uses the color purple in its liturgical kaleidoscope.
Following Advent, the season of Christmas--identified by the color white--lasts for 12 days.
Immediately thereafter, the season of Epiphany (green) begins and continues until Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent (purple). Of all the commemorations that the Church has practiced throughout its history, Lent--or the time of preparation for Christ’s Passion--was the first season that the early church celebrated.
The season of Easter begins on Easter Sunday and lasts for six weeks. The color white makes a return in our sanctuaries as it is the symbol of power and triumph.
Pentecost, which recognizes the gift of the Holy Spirit as well as the birth of the Church, is a day rather than a season. As it symbolizes fire and the Holy Spirit, red is the liturgical color that is used on that particular Sunday.
Finally, as identified by the color green which suggests growth, Ordinary Time commences and reaches its conclusion in late November on Christ the King Sunday. Clocking in at 6 months, it is by far the longest season in the church calendar. The green stole on our pulpit signifies that our journey through Ordinary Time has just begun.
So, once again, welcome to Ordinary Time.
In sharing what would become a most-familiar passage, the author of Ecclesiastes waxes philosophically about time:
“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to throw away;
a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.”
In truth, I’ve never found these words to be particularly comforting, save for the familiar song, “Turn, Turn, Turn” which was written by Pete Seeger and later popularized by the Byrds in the 1960s. I don’t like to imagine that there should be a time for breaking down, mourning, dying, refraining from embracing, or hating. It must be noted, however, that the author is not intending to be prescriptive in his or her statements, but rather descriptive.
This is a true word: “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.” Whether we like it or not, our world exposes us to a variety of times and seasons; many of which we do not wish for or invite. This notion can be comforting in that it helps us to know that time—and the circumstances and seasons that we experience—does in fact ‘turn’ and that nothing lasts forever.
To be alive means to take our ‘turn’ through different times; namely, birth and growth, loss and grief, fertility and barrenness, decline and release. The longer we live, the more seasons we experience. The more ‘turns’ we take.
One of the rich blessings of being church together is that we get to share time together. Church provides us with a family who will go through the different seasons of life with us. These brothers and sisters in Christ commit themselves to celebrate with us in good times and will mourn alongside us during times of loss and tragedy. In this way, God is able to transform the times that we are experiencing into seasons of redemption regardless of the circumstances.
The time we experience, and the lives that we live, are anything but Ordinary. We know this. God’s presence with us, however, can make the time we measure extraOrdinary by redeeming it for good.
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Photo credit to thirdrva.org