This Sunday for Mass you’ll see that Christmas decorations are put away, the pine needles from the trees around the altar have been vacuumed up, and the priest will almost certainly make a joke during the homily about how we’re in Ordinary Time now, but you know there’s really nothing “ordinary” about it.
Exhibit A: this Sunday’s Gospel reading. You probably know the story well. Jesus was at a wedding with Mary and his disciples. The wine ran out, and then Jesus performs the first of his public miracles; Mary brings the need to his attention, and he then turns water into wine. He makes the extraordinary flow out of the ordinary.
So why would the Church give us these readings at the beginning of Ordinary Time? Why wouldn’t they give us a more “ordinary” story of Jesus and the Apostles for us to relate to during Ordinary Time? Maybe a story about them walking from town A to town B and discussing something. But instead, we get something unexpected.
Usually, we only expect God to work in our lives during the “special” liturgical seasons. Maybe every year we get a lot out of Lent – maybe through our Lenten sacrifices or going on an extra retreat or adding to our prayer routine. Maybe during Advent we take a good look at how we can “prepare the way of the Lord” in our lives. Then we come to Christmas and Easter after those seasons of preparation, and we feel closer to God and in tip-top spiritual shape as we celebrate. But over 60% of the liturgical calendar in the Church year is Ordinary Time.
It’s almost like we expect God to be thinking, “Hmm I really want to work with Brian on patience, but meh it’s Ordinary Time, I’ll start giving him some Holy Spirit nudges the night before Ash Wednesday so we can hit the ground running during an “Important” season.” Or maybe “Wow, Rachael is on fire this Easter Season and that was a great Pentecost for her! She’s really primed for sharing her faith with her friends right now. Too bad Advent is like five and a half months away.”
God wants our hearts now. Today. Don’t put off diving deeper in your spiritual life. We should think of Ordinary Time as a time when God “ordinarily” does extraordinary things in us and through us during the “off-season”. So how do we get ready for that? Well think about the things you find helpful during Lent and Advent. Does fasting or making some kind of sacrifice deepen your Lent? You can actually do that all year round. Just make it sustainable, since Ordinary Time might be more of a marathon whereas Lent can be sort of a sprint in comparison, but we can still make commitments that will be helpful for us. Give up snacks or screens once a week. Or build in some days or weeks of giving something up before a big event like a family member’s wedding or a friend’s surgery, as a special way to pray for them. If you’ve done some sort of devotional booklet for Advent or Lent that you loved, there are plenty of daily prayer practices you can do throughout the whole year that can keep the rhythm and routine going so you develop a strong habit. Get to Confession. Go on a retreat. God still wants to work powerfully even now! And then once we’re finally in those “special” seasons, we’ll be that much better prepared to go even deeper. If we were to ask the Apostles what it was like to go through a whole year with Jesus, I’m sure they’d be quick to say, “trust me, there was nothing ordinary about any part of that.”