The gift of the ordinary

At the church I currently attend, last Sunday (actually, now, the one before because I hadn't got round to finishing this, but my point still stands) was announced as "the fourth Sunday before Advent" in the lectionary, following on from the "twenty-something after Trinity". This way of naming Sundays isn't new to me, but I was remined of it, and aside from being in denial about how quickly Christmas is approaching, I baulk at it.

I want ordinary time back, please. 

I know there are other denominations where ordinary time still exists, and others still where it never has. I also know that even in my church it is only the nomenclature which has changed, this is, really still ordinary time, still liturgically green. 

But names matter. And I believe we need the ordinary. 

Don't get me wrong, I think we need special and unique and extraordinary too. I am very much in favour of marking special occasions, of finding ways to celebrate and ways to acknowledge suffering. But not all the time. I think we should also be prepared to embrace and enjoy the ordinary. I don't think we have to pretend everything has to be anything other than, well, just, ordinary.

If we didn't know it already, surely 2020 taught us that we actually do want and need the ordinary; the dull, humdrum reality of the familiarity and normality of every day life. 

The various versions of a gratitude diary I have kept periodically have always been about reminding me to focus my gratitude and joy not on the big things, but in those little every day moments. They haven't been about trying to find or create something special to happen each day, but rather about seeking out or just recognising the positives in my everyday normality. Some days they are harder to find than others, I know, but every day holds things within it that are beautiful and precious. Ordinary things, in ordinary times are also a gift. 

In terms of the church embracing ordinary time, though, for me, it goes deeper than that too. 

I think there is great value in the church calendar witnessing to and celebrating the importance of the ordinary. For me the great beauty of the incarnation story is that it is a story of God's presence within the ordinary. That it makes real a God that is found in the every day: in human relationships and human realities, in shared meals and shared stories.

I believe in a God who is present in the ordinary. Of course God is present in the big newsworthy events too, in the high points and the low points of our individual and collective human existence. But God is also present in our every day and I fear that in squeezing out ordinary time we risk squeezing out the reminders that this too, maybe even this above all is where God belongs, where God is incarnate, where God is with us. 

And that, (though I doubt the writers of the lectionary are listening) is why I want ordinary time back, please.