‘O Come, O Come Emmanuel and ransom captive Israel…that mourns in lonely exile here…until the Son of God appear.’

These words of the beautiful Advent Carol struck me deeply this week and I carried them with me and deeply pondered them.

They got me thinking about the word ‘mournful’. I often find that there is a big emphasis on joy in some circles in the Church and also in the world in general. We’re supposed to be happy and bubbly all the time, smiling and laughing, showing the world a joyful demeanour and if someone looks a bit sad and downcast or is a little pensive they are often told to ‘Smile! Be positive! Be grateful! Count your blessings!’

None of these things are bad, of course, we should count our blessings and be grateful. However, things should always be in their right place and sometimes we don’t remember that before we were an ‘Easter people’, we were a people that ‘mourns in lonely exile here’.’ And that’s ok. It’s ok to mourn if the occasion calls for it. It’s ok to sit with grief and sorrow, to carry it and ponder it and let it have its place. In fact, it’s essential. Otherwise, if our natural feelings of sorrow are suppressed, pushed away and ignored, they fester and grow like a cancer and cause many problems later on.

I remember on the 1st anniversary on my father’s death, I was in my early twenties and I was overcome with grief and loss and wept like I hadn’t in the whole previous year. The first year had been shock and numbness and now reality had hit with full force and I was completely bereft. A family friend said to me, ‘Why are you crying? It’s been a year, you should be over it by now.’ That was like a dagger in my heart and I felt for a long time afterwards that there was something wrong with me for mourning and grieving and feeling sadness that my beloved father was not coming back. I would never see him sitting at the end of the table drinking his coffee every morning and all the warmth and security that came with that was lost. The comment tormented me for years and I wondered why I couldn’t just ‘get over’ my father’s death. In time, I was blessed with the understanding that there was nothing wrong with me, I was experiencing a very normal and human process, one which is different for each person and has no rules and time frame and one which no other person has any right to comment on or judge. I was even surprised some years later that I could remember that comment without the sting and I could also feel joy and be light hearted again. Everything in it’s right place and in God’s time.

So let these normal human emotions have their place and their expression, in tears and quietness and solitude for a time. This is a very Catholic concept; the Chosen people, our spiritual ancestors, knew this and lived it. They knew what it was to be in exile, to feel abandoned, to be slaves, to lament and to wonder if there was any hope. They lived sadness and grief and this is evidenced in the heart rending and haunting words and songs in some books of the Old Testament as they waited and waited for the Saviour…’How long, O Lord?’ 

It’s part of emotional maturity to know and accept that life is not one dimensional, we can’t always be upbeat and joyful. Life is full of peaks and troughs and accepting this helps us to be integrated and fully human. After all, the heights are all the more sweet for having experienced the depths.

This Advent and Christmas let’s embrace this dichotomy, let’s fully live this time of Advent, as the whole world waits with bated breath, anticipating the momentous event which will soon occur. Let’s unite ourselves with our Jewish ancestors who didn’t hide from sadness but who mourned their human condition and their lack of a Saviour but who also held on and hoped and waited with hopeful expectation ‘until the Son of God appeared’ and then could fully celebrate and let go with joyful abandon and rejoice with the whole Heavenly Host!

~ By Sara Moore

Sara is from southern NSW with her husband, Damian and their four children.  Apart from her faith and family, Sara’s great loves are literature, history, art and making her home a beautiful and restful place for her family and friends.