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“Advent is the season that, when properly understood, does not flinch from the darkness that stalks us all in this world. Advent begins in the dark and moves toward the light– but the season should not move too quickly or too glibly, lest we fail to acknowledge the depth of the darkness.

As Jesus tells us, unless we see the light of God clearly, what we call light is actually darkness: ‘how great is that darkness!’ (Matt 6:23) Advent bids us to take a fearless inventory of the darkness: the darkness without and the darkness within.

Advent is designed to show that the meaning of Christmas is diminished to the vanishing point if we are not willing to take a fearless inventory of the darkness.”

by Fleming Rutledge

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