(LifeSiteNews) — Advent is the season of the pregnant woman. It represents the last stage of the expecting time. Not too many generations ago, the last weeks of pregnancy, reminiscent of the days leading to the Feast of the Nativity, were called the “time of the woman’s confinement.” But this is a joyful confinement.
As I serve out these last few months of my confinement in federal prison, my feeling of expectancy grows — particularly as my fifth grandchild’s birth is expected within that time. The joy of anticipating the freedom to hold a baby, love my family and serve the Lord who came as a baby to his Holy Family, is rising within me.
My wife and I had the tremendous blessing of experiencing 5 of our 6 pregnancies during the Advent season of darkening days, drawing siblings and parents to the warm, womb-like household. In the early evenings, there was a sense that all was well, and the children were snug in bed.
Men and women experience this time differently.
The toils of the day over, a pregnant wife turns her eyes to her husband, knowing she is more vulnerable during her pregnancy than at any other time of her adulthood. A pregnant woman sees through the feminist lies about the uselessness of men. A woman grown round with child has a million fears as this little one grows beneath her heart. She seeks another to love this little one as she does.
A father, on masculine watch, fears being ensnared in hormone-driven passions and emotional needs. He believes he can provide re-assurance by directing discussion out over future years for the child. What will he teach her or him? What sports will he or she like? Where will he or she go to college? What profession might he or she choose? And on and on. He does this because men have a natural fear of a new emotional attachment that will have a claim on him. Though modern man is trained to be stupid on this point, he already has a vague feeling that this child will seize his heart and enchant him. And so she or he will.
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A year or so before my imprisonment, I sat in my son-in-law’s living room with him, listening as his daughter (my granddaughter) tried to speak and made baby noises from her bedroom while being changed by her Nana.
I turned to him and said “it’s great to have a little one in the house.”
“Nothing better,” he responded.
Women being more practical, the pregnant mother will shorten the father’s thoughts about the distant future to the immediate prenatal and newborn needs. There is plenty of time later to talk about Little League, soccer and college. She will have many nursings on the third watch to ponder the future years.
Advent’s shortening days and diminished sunshine bring out Christmas decorations which hang everywhere like the mobiles over a baby’s crib. The hanging ornaments, the garland, the Christmas card tree, the Christmas tree itself, the mangers–they all serve to create a dim glow within the home that seems to speak the sacred word “hearth.” This dimming contrasts with the pregnant mother’s bright color scheme for the baby’s nursery. She swaddles the home as she will swaddle the baby. Only a woman can bring off the seeming contradiction of light and dark in her home. This is because the baby is already living in that home with her.
Advent draws us to the manger of our own homes as it drags the world to kneel at the foot of a crib.
Fellow pro-lifers, Advent and Christmas Week are manifestly our time of the year. They express hope and anticipation. The journey of salvation begins with a baby’s birth. The Advent season contains within it the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, reminding us that Our Lady, too, was an unborn baby. Advent also carries the feast day of the very pregnant Lady of Guadalupe (our Patroness), as well as the feast day of her servant, Juan Diego. Christmas Week has the feast days of the great martyrs Stephen and Thomas à Becket and the feast day of the infant victims of the Herodian slaughter. And it has the Feast of St. John, the only Apostle they could not kill, although they tried.
It is the Time of Mary, who ever draws us to the worship of her Baby. She carries Him under her heart, as my wife says.
John Hinshaw is serving a custodial sentence for attempting to save the lives of babies in a late-term abortion business in Washington, D.C., an undertaking a court found was in violation of the FACE Act. Letters to John should be addressed:
JOHN HINSHAWRegister #93685-509FMC DevensFederal Medical CenterP.O. BOX 879Ayer, MA 01432