In Mary’s Magnificat we hear the voice of a young prophet - not only is Mary a woman, but she is YOUNG - and yet she demonstrates a deep understanding of the plight of her people, and of herself as part of that people. And, even more remarkably to me today, her expression is uttered to her cousin Elizabeth. One of the most radical and often suppressed songs of resistance ever recorded by humans is spoken by a young woman to an older woman.
I especially love how she speaks in present tense: God has filled the hungry. God has shown strength. Here and now, God has done this. She is sure, even though she can’t see all the evidence. This is the Advent posture.
So I’m thinking of the Magnificat this week alongside my own feelings and observations of holiday futility - obligatory shopping and gift-giving, obligatory visits with family we may or may not enjoy, the ongoing pandemic and worsening environmental crisis, wealth disparity and racial inequity, and on and on. They want me to think about hope, peace, joy, and love NOW? Even though I can’t see the evidence?
It’s not a far leap for me, in light of the plight of my own people, from love to depression - the 4th stage of grief according to Dr. Kessler and Dr. Kubler-Ross. It occurs to me that I wouldn’t feel such grief for the world if I did not love it. I wouldn’t experience the low feelings of depression if they had no contrast with the heights of love. It’s almost as if depression, with its cynical but fairly (overly?) realistic take on things as they are, invites me into more love. Love in spite of. Love bearing witness to. Love wide open. Love loving everything, here and now.
People tell us: love is risky. Love opens us to the pain of loss. They say: grief is love with nowhere to go.* I mostly think they’re right. Love has polarity, like every unified thing in existence. And it seems grief, specifically depression, can be a very Advent-y pathway to perceiving that whole.
God, many of us experience melancholy, even despair.
We know what it's like to feel overwhelmed by sadness at times.
Some of us are lifelong companions of depression.
We empathize with the misery we witness in the world.