Stories, poems, and music aren’t just ways to pass the time; they can also help us open our hearts and focus our minds on God. Today’s reflection invites us to refresh our view of the Nativity through the written word to better prepare our hearts to be dwelling places for Christ.

December 15, 2024: Third Sunday of Advent, Year C‍

Zephaniah 3:14–18a

Isaiah 12:2–3, 4, 5–6

Philippians 4:4–7

Luke 3: 10–18

Songs and Stories

A reflection by Ann Marie Szpakowska

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“Each Winter As the Year Grows Older” by Annabeth Gay

Each winter as the year grows older, we each grow older too.

The chill sets in a little colder; the verities we knew seem shaken and untrue.

When race and class cry out for treason, when sirens call for war.

They over shout the voice of reason and scream ‘til we ignore all we held dear before.

Yet I believe beyond believing, that life can spring from death

That growth can flower from our grieving, that we can catch our breath and turn transfixed by faith.

So even as the sun is turning to journey to the North,

The living flame in secret burning can kindle on the earth and bring God’s love to birth.

O Child of ecstasy and sorrows, O Prince of Peace and pain,

Brighten today’s world by tomorrow’s, renew our lives again.

Lord Jesus, come and reign.

Being born on the cusp of the Autumnal Equinox has left an imprint on my soul. Not only is fall my favorite season–it being the time of harvest–but Advent is my favorite liturgical season as well. As all of God’s creatures gather and gorge, preparing for winter’s cold blast, I, too, scour for songs, poems, prayers, images and books that feed my longing for Christ’s rebirth.

Over the years, it has become a tradition for Dignity/Buffalo to celebrate the third Sunday of Advent together as our preparation for Christmas. We gather for song and prayer, poems, readings and reflection, and the lighting of the Advent wreath, all followed by a bowl of gumbo. Thus, it has become “Gaudete and Gumbo.” Often, we open our time together with John Piper’s “Advent Beauty”:

Tilting on her yearly track

Advent beauty circles back,

Flying faster with the years,

Hardly giving time for tears

First to dry upon the cheek—

Has it been more than a week

Since we laid both young and old


In the ground now winter cold?

Has there really been a spring

When the birds began to sing?

Has there been both summer, fall

Since the Baby in the stall

Called us with a Christmas bell

to sing, O Come, Immanuel?

Tilting on her yearly track

Advent beauty circles back,

Flying faster with the years—

Ah, but overtaking fears.

Let the Lord of advent lift

Every care (an early gift!);

See the Savior and the Son

Shine in advent candle one.

During November and December, I find myself searching high and low for additions to my Advent playlist of songs and hymns which encapsulate our waiting for Christ, such as “Each Winter as the Year Grows Older,” “Mary, Did You Know?” or “Breath of Heaven.”

I also look for children’s books which tell the stories and miracles of Christ’s appearance, then and now. I gravitate towards those books which look at the infancy narratives through a cultural lens, such as Every Man Heart Lay Down by Lorenz Graham and An Aboriginal Carol by David Bouchard, based on the Huron Carol. While rummaging through a book bin, I came across Fear Not, Joseph by Julie Stiegemeyer, which focuses on Joseph’s often overlooked role in the Nativity. The infancy narratives, retold from different backgrounds and for different generations, can help us see Christ’s Nativity afresh.

Stories can also open our hearts as we prepare ourselves for Christmas. The first story I recall hearing as a child was The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen. It was not the most edifying Christmas tale. Years later, I read Leo Tolstoy’s story of Papa Panov, which has several versions illustrated for children: Papa Panov’s Special Day or Papa Panov’s Special Christmas. This story, which recounts Jesus visiting an old man in the people he meets and cares for on Christmas Day, encapsulates the meaning of Advent for me–waiting and searching for Christ in each other and being Christ for one another. This is what John the Baptist instructs the crowds to do as they wait for the coming of Christ in today’s gospel reading; we, too, must care for those around us as we wait for the coming of Christ, just as Papa Panov does. The last time Dignity/Buffalo shared this reading, we each had to pass the book around when tears welled up and we were unable to continue.

Advent is our reminder that God is in our midst because we are birthers of Christ, as Meister Eckhart tells us. The prophet Zephaniah calls us to rejoice, since “the Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save” (Zeph 3:17). John, in his prologue, states that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). May all our encounters continue to reveal Christ to us, and may we rejoice as we welcome the Living God, who dwells in our midst.

Ann Marie Szpakowska has been active and in leadership of Dignity/Buffalo for nearly 40 years. She also participates in the Women's Caucus and has been an active contributor to Liturgical planning for Dignity's Conventions Conferences and on Feminist Liturgy Committees over many years. She has presented workshops both locally and at Dignity Conventions.                                                            

She has also been a member of St. Martin de Porres parish since 4 inner city churches merged and built a new sanctuary in 1993. St. Martin de Porres is a predominantly African American community in Buffalo New York.

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