Casting off

1 Advent C 2012
http://www.lectionarypage.net/YearC_RCL/Advent/CAdv1_RCL.html


It was my job to cast off the lines.

My earliest memories are of salt water and my father’s boat. In those days, back on Long Island, any working-class guy could have some sort of leaky wooden boat and old, worn-out motor and spend time out fishing. That was Dad’s great joy, and so little Kurt just like my older brothers before me would be bundled in a stained orange life-vest and would help Dad get the boat ready.

There was a lot of “get ready”—mixing the gas and oil in the old-fashioned orange tank, gathering the gear and loading it. The boat would rock gently, tied up there next to the old wooden dock with its planks bleached grey by sun and salt. But finally the time would come—the time to cast off.

It was my job to move first to the stern, then to the prow, and slip the loops at the end of the ropes off of the cleats that held our old boat safely to the worn, familiar dock. It was a moment that placed us in the ancient tradition of sailors and voyagers, even if we were only going a couple of miles out to fish. The weight of the boat would hold the line too tight to easily slip off the cleat, and so I would have to exert a moment’s effort to pull the line taut, then suddenly slacken it so for a moment it was loose enough to lift from the cleat. As I slipped the final loop from the cleat, I would always glance down, and even the oily water next to the dock would seem deep and mysterious below our fragile wooden shell.

Finally, a shove would give the boat enough of a surge of motion away from the dock that it would float free, rocking gently, making itself and we who depended on it creatures of the restless water. A philosopher said that you never cross the same river twice. It is even more true of the sea—it is restless and ever-moving, never the same from moment to moment. I would sit and as the motor sputtered into life and the boat surged forward, I would feel a momentary thrill, a sinking in the pit of my stomach as if I were flying. You never knew what awaited you, even in the harbors and bays of Long Island. You never knew where the voyage would take you, once you had cast off.

“Almighty God, give us grace to cast away the works of darkness…”

Most of us love Advent and find many words to express that. This first Collect of Advent is filled with contrast—“cast away”, “put on”. This Advent it is the “cast away” part that snatches my heart. I love this Collect, but often find myself a little embarrassed by that expression “works of darkness.” I am certainly a sinful man, self-absorbed and petty, but my sinfulness never quite seems to live up to the ominous grandeur of “works of darkness.” Voldemort and Sauron and the White Witch in fantasy books do “works of darkness.” My sins seem to lack the kind of evil courage and initiative implied by the majesty of “works of darkness.”

But there are many “works of darkness”, and most of them are not fame-worthy. I also remember, when we would cast off from shore how many years ago, how littered and shabby and drab was the dock and the shoreline where we would ready the boat. No one would want to spend any more time on that grubby shore of Centerport Harbor than they needed to.

The “works of darkness” can be that familiar and drab and hope-less place where we have been accustomed to hang out in, for no good reason other than it is familiar. What is our equivalent of the dry, dirty, familiar harbor-side in our own lives? A faith that has grown cold and routine? Habits of resentment or self-pity? A general hopelessness that does not cripple us, but casts a shadow over every day? A pattern of distraction, of noise or virtual communication or repetitive entertainment, that keeps us from seeing the heart-breaking beauty and wonder of the world around us? Or keeps us from seeing the pathos and silent courage and struggle of those around us?

Today our patron Saint Paul reaches out in hope and love and pity to us, wishing that we ccould recover that beauty and delight that we may have lost even without our knowing. “Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may …restore whatever is lacking in your faith… And may he so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.”

A Celtic Christian said, “Jesus is the memory of what we have forgotten about God.”

As we cast off on this Advent Sunday, what have we forgotten? What is lacking in our faith? What part of our hearts has grown weak, even without our knowing?

Years ago, we would usually cast off before dawn. As it rose and fell with the surge, I used to imagine that the boat itself was remembering that it was not just a rickety old wooden shell flipped upside-down on sawhorses in our yard. It was a free creature of the sea, part of the surge and swell and power of the waves.

The sun would rise and turn the waves into gold and fire. We too were creatures of the sea, and of the dawn, part of the surge and the light. I would wake up from the drowsy, chilly walking dream in which I had helped to get the boat ready to cast off. That’s right, I would think. I remember. That’s why we came. This is who we are. This is why we cast off.