Advent Day 43: Turn Over

On the sixth day of Christmas your true love may give you six geese a-laying, but for most of us, we will be receiving a turnover on the page of the calendar. It’s the end of the old year and the beginning of a new one. In the interest of religious neutrality, the convention for identifying time is BCE and CE (Before the Common Era and Common Era). Some will remember when another convention was used, BC, Before Christ and AD, Anno Domini, that is, in the year of the Lord. The majority of the planet marks time in reference to the Birth of Jesus Christ.

The New Year celebration is a mark in time, a convenient point to reflect on the past and plan for the future. You have done this many times before at this turning point of the old year into the new one. But this year you are on a journey through Advent. You have been awakened to the Teachings of Jesus. As you reflect on the past, include your preconceived notions about Jesus which may have fallen by the wayside as you’ve come in a closer relationship with his words and teachings. Use your journey journal and reflect on how this new understanding moves you into the new day and the New Year.

We end with the final verse, the 24^th hour of St. Nersess Shnorhali’s Confession of Faith, Glorious Lord, receive the prayers of your servant and fulfill my requests that are deemed good. Through the intercession of the Holy Mother of God, and St. John the Baptist, and St. Stephen the first martyr, and St. Gregory our Illuminator, and the Holy Apostles, Prophets, Doctors of the Church, Martyrs, Patriarchs, Hermits, Virgins, and all your saints in heaven and on earth. Unto you, indivisible Holy Trinity, be glory and honor, forever and ever. Amen.