Concluding the Advent season

In the last couple of months, we have witnessed enough human history to fill years. During that short time frame, hurricanes have wrecked the lives of many in the American South. Donald Trump became only the second man to win non-consecutive terms as president of the United States. Meanwhile, in the Middle East, the Assad regime collapsed in Syria. The war between Russia and Ukraine continues with the threat of nuclear deployment ever-present. President Joe Biden pardoned his son while Daniel Penny was acquitted on charges related to his restraining of a homeless man on a New York subway car. The University of Michigan removed requirements for diversity, inclusion, and exclusion statements from faculty applications, one of several markers that the “woke” ideology has crested in its cultural power. The U.K. Parliament gave sanction to suicide in its “assisted dying” bill.

These events have filled observers with a combination of hope and fear—the thought that a new day is dawning or that a catastrophic disaster is erupting.

Believers would do well to respond with a perspective offered by the Church’s traditional liturgical calendar. This year, from Dec. 1 through today, many Christians observed Advent. The English word stems from the Latin adventus, meaning “arrival” or “coming.” Churches that follow the ancient liturgical season focus this time on Christ’s comings—both His first in a manger at Bethlehem and His second in the time to come.

This season warns us against overwrought reactions to current events. On one hand, Advent cautions against utopianism. We tend to see this view from the victors after a hard-fought election cycle or cultural battle concludes. The election of Donald Trump, we hear from his supporters, ushers in a new age of renewal.

Yet, in human political affairs, most victories do not vindicate the joy the victors invest in them. Social and cultural gains tend to be partial, not total. The retreat of more progressive forces on sexuality and like issues is far from a collapse. Instead, it looks more like a retrenchment. Moreover, these victories often are temporal, giving significant if not total ground back as soon as the next election. The longstanding stalemate in the Syrian civil war, the collapse of which shocked the world, provides a helpful picture of this score. Still more, political outcomes themselves can be mixed bags, bringing in elements upholding God’s truth while others either are adiaphora or antagonistic to the gospel. We still get the Matt Gaetz nomination, for instance, wherein persistent depravity is conveniently ignored or explained away.

Advent counsels us that total, final, and pure victory for God’s people waits for Christ’s return. Then any questions about the “lesser of two evils” in our politics will be answered. Never again will betrayal and corruption plague our electoral choices. Instead, we will see perfect justice and righteousness mixed with lavish mercy, all displayed in the rule of our risen Lord.

On the other hand, Advent instructs believers to reject a posture of aloof resignation to society and politics. We should not wash our hands of social engagement and political advocacy. Such retreat never accorded with Scripture. We know God ordained society and politics for our good and His glory. To abandon them is to reject God’s will.

Yet, on this side of Bethlehem and Calvary, we even have more reason to engage. The kingdom of God has broken in miraculously, never to go away. We see it in the ministry of Jesus on earth, in His teaching, His healing, and His rising from the dead. We experience this kingdom inbreaking most of all as part of the Church, transformed by God’s Word, nourished by His sacraments, and cared for by our Lord through the kindness of fellow believers.

However, we also should strive to see God’s kingdom encouraged and obeyed in the kingdoms of this world. Again, God ordained them for good. We are called to work in and through them to honor God and to love our neighbor. This calling includes helping those we have watched suffer natural and man-made disasters these last few months. This calling includes restraining evil and protecting the innocent from being preyed upon by fashionable ideologies whether they are children, the terminally ill, or anyone else.

As we conclude this Advent season, we should live in the tension of the already and the not yet. We should look at the events of the past few months as displaying the possibilities for doing God’s work on earth and the limits to what that work can accomplish. We should rejoice that the Messiah has come, that the kingdom is here. We should long for the Messiah to come again, for that moment when we shall see finally fulfilled the promise that “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever” (Revelation 11:15).