"Advent, really, is about throwing out the ash of our lives—bitterness, resentments, recriminations. The behaviors that no longer protect us, the anger that is no longer a sign that something has gone wrong, but has become the wrong thing. Where once it signaled that something was harming the love in a relationship, now it has become an obstacle to love. Advent, with its inventory and confession of sin, and its repentance—which means, to turn back, so that when we repent, we turn back from the course we’re on and choose another, better course—the Advent season is our call
to shovel out all the ash of our lives so that air can get through, so that the spark of God within us can become the fire of God’s love that warms us, and with which we warm the icy world."
