Nicole Ferrante works as the Campus Ministry Coordinator at the University of St. Michael’s College. She is a graduate of the MDiv program at the Regis St. Michael’s Faculty of Theology.
The air is getting colder and the days are getting shorter. Meanwhile, our hearths are being warmed and the world is being illuminated by lights. The city is at its loudest and its quietest all at once. The malls are filled with music and bustling with more people than ever… yet the frigid evening streets are becoming strangely empty and the signs of wildlife around us are fewer and further between.
It is a time of waiting. And a time of choice–to get swept away in the busyness of all that is happening around us, or to lean into the silence and the stillness that lies surreptitiously below it all.
At the Annunciation, the angel Gabriel appears to Mary at a time just such as that. Betrothed and amidst all the happenings of her young life, the messenger of God comes to her in a moment of solitude, saying to her, “Do not be afraid…for you have found favour with God”, and telling of the plan that God has for her (Luke 1:30). Mary questions this message, probing how it can be possible that she, a virgin, is called to bear into the world the Son of God. But the angel reassures her that all will be possible, and Mary, receiving that message into her heart, answers, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word” (Luke 1:37).
“Here am I”, or in today’s speech, I am here. They are simple but profound words. Because it is worth questioning… are we here? Are we available to God and to those around us? Is there room in our hearts, our minds, and our lives, for what is most important? Or are our minds completely consumed by the distractions of our busy world and our busy lives? Are we truly present?
As our Advent readings progress, we see the theme of presence continue to unfold in a beautiful way in the life of Mary as, in the scene of the Visitation, Mary leaves her home to visit her cousin Elizabeth and help her in her pregnancy. Here we see Mary say once again, not in word but in action, “I am here”. I am here to help where help is needed. I am here, present and available. And in her presence, her openness, and her receptivity, she is drawn closer to those she loves, and she is found rejoicing and praising God aloud with them.
What would it look like if we were to live this Advent in quiet, open, attentiveness? If we were to resist the pull of consumerism that keeps us from being authentically present to the little things in life? If we were to take a step back from the constant stimulus of Netflix and social media that numb us to our everyday experiences? Each of us knows, deep down in our hearts, what it is that is keeping us from being attentive and open to the presence of God in our lives, and from being able to be fully present to those around us.
In the busyness of exams, work life, and the fast-approaching holiday season, the voices that rush through our heads can easily push us towards stress, anxiety, or despair. We feel pressure on ourselves to prove ourselves, to succeed, to please others. But it is in the silence, in the calm, that the voice of God is able to break through and say to us, “Do not be afraid… for you have found favour with God”, to assure us that there is a plan for our lives, a unique and beautiful plan, and to remind us that “nothing will be impossible with God” (Luke 1:30, 37). Only when we let that love in and trust that liberating message of God are we are able to respond, alongside Mother Mary, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”
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