Pacing
Ourselves for the Holidays
Fr.
Tony’s Midweek Message
December
20, 2017
Those
of you who have only known me the last 6 years might find it hard to imagine
that your rector, now a rotund and portly man (that sounds so much more
distinguished than “lard-bottomed”) once trained for and ran a full marathon,
in 1989 in Taiwan. One of
the key things I learned in those months of training was the importance of
pacing oneself. At the start of the marathon
run, you feel pretty good and want to let it all out and go for speed. But that guarantees running out of steam early
and the ability to run at all, or a complete crash against the “wall” that hits
most runners at about the 20-mile line that is the main reason behind failure
to complete the 26.5 mile race. Pacing
means going slower and more easily than feels right, but marshals and conserves
strength and staying power. Sometimes it
means a slower pace of steps; sometimes it involves taking longer strides to
get more distance from the steps thus reduced.
As
we approach the peak of the holiday season, let’s remember to pace
ourselves. Trying to do too much in too
little time, spend too much on too small a budget, make Christmas “just perfect”
by the standards of commercial-driven nostalgia or liturgy-police churchiness
is a recipe for burnout, holiday depression, and a generally unhappy mid-winter
experience.
One thing that we can do is limit our
excursions, whether for shopping, partying, or concert-going, to a one-or two-a-day
maximum. Another is to focus (and strengthen) our
charitable giving and service on only one or two well thought-out and
intentional efforts. Don’t overdo eating or drinking: it will only make us feel miserable in the
end. Another way of pacing ourselves is
remembering that there are twelve days to Christmas (Dec. 25-January 6) rather
than just one. You don’t need to get
everything done for some mythical magic moment when Santa comes down the chimney. You can continue your gift-giving, holiday meals,
and visits until Epiphany—no rush or December 24 deadline.
Another
way of taking pressure off is to make time for prayer and meditation, as well
as intentional rather than on-auto-pilot church-going. This is easy this year, since the Sunday of Fourth
Advent falls this year the morning of Christmas Eve. So we will be having a single morning Sunday
service on December 24 at 9 a.m., rather than our usual 8:00 a.m. and 10:00
a.m. services. Then that evening we have
the regular three services at 4 p.m. (children’s), 6:00 p.m. (with carols), and
10:30 p.m. (Midnight Mass with festival choir and instrumentalists, followed by
light snacks in the parish hall). On
Monday, Christmas Day, we will have short and simple 10 a.m. service with
carols.
Merry
Christmas and keep safe.
Fr.
Tony+
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