Gaudete: Rejoice. Rose Pink Sunday
Don't be surprised if we do things somewhat differently in our parish - - not defying authority, but because we think for ourselves and we deal with wherever it is we find ourselves in life.
Advent is our best example: we don't thumb our nose at the church's traditional somber Advent, we just transfer our Bitter Time, if that's an apt word, from the joyously happy November December holiday season to October November because memories of Category 5 Hurricane Michael are still fresh and sharp for so many of us, and also the Covid Pandemic that for a while looked like it was going to claim all our lives.
So we exercise Advent as happy Time: Christmas is coming. There will always be theological purists who insist that Easter commemorating Christ's death and resurrection is the topmost Christian Event; but they are a somber, morbid bunch: our topmost Christian celebration is Christmas, the Nativity, that God cared enough about us in the first place to come among us as one of us. So, the First Place: Christmas, the Nativity of Jesus Christ, is our main religious story. For us, Advent is not to mope around pretending to dread the End Time and Second Coming, which so far has proved an elusive non-event, Advent is to decorate the Christmas Tree.
We are a religion of stories, and our story has evolved into a fifth-gospel mix of the Nativity of Jesus Christ according to Luke and Matthew. I mean, it's our story, we can do what we will with it. If the Roman Catholic Church can tell the story with Mary married to an impotent old man bringing half a dozen children into an unconsummated celibate marriage as Jesus' step-siblings in order to preserve Mary's eternal virginity, the rest of us can celebrate Christmas where Matthew's camels and wise men show up with Luke's shepherds. It's our story, it belongs to us, and your version is as valid as ours, and vice versa.
But I wanted to stick my nose into Advent anyway. This, the Third Sunday of Advent, is Rejoice Sunday, Gaudete, Rose Sunday, the Sunday we light the pink candle in the Advent Wreath. What's that all about?!
Long ago, the Pope authorized a Mid-Lent and Mid-Advent easing of the strict penitential observance, by lightening up a bit for the third Sunday of Advent (Gaudete) and the fourth Sunday of Lent (Laetare). There could be otherwise forbidden refreshments to eat. Flowers or greenery could be on the altar and such, there could be organ music, and instead of deep penitential purple vestments, the church liturgical color could be rose pink. So, it became "Rose Sunday."
And also, for Advent, Gaudete or Rejoice Sunday, for the day's Introit to the Mass. Largely disappeared, giving way to the entry processional hymn, the introit was the first thing done in the service, as the ministers entered the church. Gaudete, Rejoice as the first words:
Gaudete in Domino semper
The Introit for the third Sunday of Advent is from Philippians 4:4-6 — “Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice: let your moderation be known unto all men: the Lord is at hand. Be careful for nothing: but in every thing, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.”
Here is the Latin text:
Gaudete in Domino semper: iterum dico, gaudete. Modestia vestra nota sit omnibus hominibus: Dominus enim prope est. Nihil solliciti sitis: sed in omni oratione et obsecratione cum gratiarum actione petitiones vestræ innotescant apud Deum.
In lots of Episcopal parishes, including my parishes during my pre-retirement years as a parish priest, Gaudete and Laetare were observed, although I never had the rose pink vestments.
Is that enough? Today's second lesson is a "rejoice" snippet from 1st Thessalonians, and I was going to talk about that, Paul's first and oldest extant epistle; but I'll save that for another Time.
T88&c
1 Thessalonians 5:16-24
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything; hold fast to what is good; abstain from every form of evil.
May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this.