Transcript of Interview with Ellen Becker, Mary Barnes about Advent in the Home. This interview and others like it can be found at http://www.catholicspotlight.com
Listen Now to the audio version of the show.
Advent in the Home is available at The Catholic Company.
http://www.catholiccompany.com/catholic-gifts/3001001/Advent-Home-Activities-Families/
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Chris: This is the Catholic Spotlight, the podcast where we talk about what’s new, cool, and exciting in the Catholic marketplace. I’m your host, Chris Cash, director of e-Commerce from catholiccompany.com, your source for all your Catholic needs.
Chris: And today in the spotlight, we have both Ellen Becker and Mary Barnes, authors of Advent in the Home: Activities for Families. Welcome, ladies! It’s glad to have you on!
Ellen: Thank you.
Mary: Thank you very much.
Chris: Now Ellen and Mary, you might want to identify yourselves a little bit here as we’re talking since there’s two of you. But I’d like to know just a little bit about your background and what brought you to write this book on advent in the home?
Mary: I’m Mary, Mary Barnes and one of the things presently, I’m the director for religious education for St. Jude parish and parents had come up to me and were asking for other possibilities besides an Advent wreath to help them celebrate Advent in their home and so as this idea kind of fermented, I was able to reach Ellen and asked her if she would willing to help with the project that would bring some other ways for families to celebrate Advent in their homes so she graciously agreed to do it. I don’t think she realized what she was getting herself into but…
Chris: A few authors ever do.
Mary: Right. So the two of us sat down and kind of brainstormed then we set up a committee that would help us and that’s kind of how it came about. It was through a desire to be able to help families with something that they had asked for that would deepen their spirituality within their home and their celebration of one of the seasons of the liturgical year.
Ellen: And I guess I’m Ellen. And a lot of the things that are in the book, I mean, when Mary asked me to do this, Advent is one of probably my favorite liturgical seasons and it’s a season that we have done a lot with in my own home with my own children growing up so it was very easy to kind of incorporate some of those things into what she was asking and helping to do and we found some new things and new ideas and learned a lot about different activities to do with families.
Chris: So, where do you really start? You said you came up with a committee to kind of guide the book, I assume?
Mary: Well, no we had no intention of actually to be honest, we never even thought in terms of the book. What we had decided to do was to put together something for parishioners for our religious ed families and originally that’s who we were looking at along with our school families and then as we got into the project, we realized we could open it up to the entire parish. And so the intent was to put on an event after all of the masses that would show people the various ways they could celebrate Advent in their homes and having what we call an Advent walkthrough. We did this at the beginning of November so that they would have time to decide what would be some extra things that they would do in order to make Advent more meaningful for their families. So it was actually a schedule of events within our parish that we decided to put together so that families could actually see things they could do beyond just having an Advent wreath in their home. From there, I was giving a presentation at a conference on multiple intelligence and at that point, I was using some of the examples of what we did in this particular event and people became intrigued by it and there was someone from OSB there and wanted more information and so that’s where the book came from. But our intention originally was just having an Advent walkthrough for parishioners that would benefit them spiritually to celebrate Advent more fully.
Chris: So then you were able to walk around and say, “God, You duped me into writing this book.”
Mary: It was a real surprise. It was a real surprise. It was a nice surprise. And our hope was that once our parishioners walked through the area and we set it up with a living room, a den, a child’s room, a kitchen, let’s see…various rooms. It was just like a house and they walked through and they saw these things displayed as if they were in their own homes, that if they took…came away with one new idea and tried it then the whole thing would be a success and we found that people were very responsive and we had a good feedback from it. And so that’s where it started.
Ellen: And the hope was kind of to that, I mean, activities are sort of I think a misleading…it’s more tradition. I mean, we have people, families have a lot of Christmas traditions that they do. We were trying to stress the fact that there are traditions that can be started during the Advent season and be part of the Advent season and bringing us to the Christ child at Christmas. So that they would hopefully build on these things and pass these things down from generation to generation so activities is kind of a misleading…we would hope for more tradition-type things.
Mary: One of the other things that we tried to incorporate too is that our parish is becoming much more aware of some of the social difficulties within our community and so each year we have a particular theme that we’re kind of concentrating all of our social actions towards. In this particular year, it was to feed the hungry and to bring awareness to some of the problems within our community. And so, what we tried to do was to and for example, in our dinner for the first week of Advent, we would bring to mind some of the problems within our community, for example, we are fortunate enough to live in homes that are normally pretty tranquil. There isn’t a lot of fighting or turmoil and so to bring to mind the families that cannot experience the quiet of this season, that we keep them in our hearts and our prayer is for them to have a sense of peace or for, as we said before, a table spread with wonderful and delicious offerings. There are people to be, bear in mind full that there are people that don’t know where their next meal is coming from, if there is a next meal. And so, to bring that element also into some of the prayer experiences and to go beyond just our immediate family but to make us aware that we also have a social responsibility in providing peace for those that don’t experience peace; helping those that do not have warmth and a safe place; to keep them in prayer and to do what we can to be of assistance there; to help those that might not be having anything for Christmas; and through giving trees within the parish to be a part of that and to be involved as, that’s part of our Advent preparation. So we tried to make some connections of things that we were doing in the parish and how we can extend that throughout the season that more fully would be another thing that would be worth something to do.
Chris: Now, I’d like to know a little more about what each of you learned from this entire experience putting this book together. Was there anything surprising you learned about Advent in particular or just about yourselves going through the process of actually creating the program and the book? Why don’t we start with you, Ellen?
Ellen: Well, this is something that I’ve never done before.
Chris: Exactly, so you have a lot to learn then.
Ellen: Yeah, I mean publishing a book was in itself, was quite an adventure and a lot of work. I have a lot of respect for people who now write books and do that sort of thing, that there’s a lot of work behind it. For me, like I said that Advent has always been a favorite time of the year, my favorite liturgical season and to be able to share that with people was very invigorating. It was good to see people excited about the different things that were presented, being able to take these things home and work with their children and that sort of thing. And the one thing for me was my children are mostly gone. They’re in their, well, I have one teenager, I guess but mostly they’re in their early 20s and are away from home so it presented a challenge to me to see what I could do to bring Advent back in the home and for us to prepare the family during this time for our age group. And one idea that came out of that was a blog that we created as a family to study the Sunday Scriptures. And we used a website that gave some reflection questions and that sort of thing to speak with one another and share our thoughts and reflections on the Sunday Scriptures during the Advent. So that was kind of a neat idea for me.
Mary: I think for myself, it was the whole concept that this is something that we can pass on from generation to generation. We have one granddaughter and as will be noted, our dedication is to our two granddaughters, Ellen’s little one and my little one. And it was with the idea that our prayer was that the season of Advent, the anticipation of the joy of Advent will extend to them and I think by having something like this, it gives us the opportunity to share some of the wonderful possibilities of waiting for the Christ child in a very, very spiritual way that we can hand that on to one generation to the next. I know the one thing that I think struck me was when we came across the Chrismon tree activity and in our living room now, that’s what our primary tree is a Chrismon tree. It’s all done in the white and the gold and the symbols are of Christ. It means Christ monogram and it’s just a beautiful, beautiful tree and yet it keeps you focused on what we are really celebrating. I think the other thing for me was it was kind of…even though it was hectic, this on for the preparation and especially getting when we went beyond that and got into the publishing area of it, it has allowed me to recognize personally to slow down and to enjoy and not get wrapped up in the hecticness of the season and to keep the focus. I know this year, Advent has been very special and I think it’s because of the experience of the last two years working with the Advent in the Home that has allowed me to do that. And it’s just a…I was very pleased at when our children, our grown children saw the end results; they were just so excited to use these things. They were surprised to see some things that we had used in our home. They recognized them right off the bat and some new things and so again, we’ve got several generations that are involved and I think that’s a real gift, real treasures to give to your children. That’s something that’s lasting.
Chris: Okay, we’re going to take a short break here to hear from our sponsor but when we come back, we’ll be speaking more with Ellen and Mary about Advent in the Home. This is the Catholic Spotlight.
Chris: And we’re back on the Catholic Spotlight with Ellen Becker and Mary Barnes and we’re talking about Advent in the Home: Activities for the Families, a great new book put out by Our Sunday Visitor Press. Ellen and Mary, you want to share a little bit about some of the very interesting activities that you put into this book? You were telling me a little earlier about a starlight one that was included and I thought that would kind of appropriate to share.
Ellen: Well, like I was saying that I like to…I’m not an astronomer by any stretch of imagination but I do like to view the constellations when I’m *** [00:17:15] in the night sky and this time of the year, we have some wonderful constellations coming up that are very distinguishable and easy to see and Advent being that people of darkness and coming into the light at Christmas and my thought was there that Mary and Joseph would have been journeying from Nazareth to Bethlehem and would have camped and been under the stars and what their thoughts might have been as they turned to the night sky and so, the activity there is for all ages and it’s just to kind of explore the night sky, not only to learn about the different constellations at this time of the year, but in the movement of the planets. Right now, we’ve got Venus and Jupiter putting on a brilliant display in early evening in the southwest sky but also to reflect on the wonder and awe of God and what He has in mind for us on our journey, on our uphill adventures that we are striving to journey here. So that’s just one activity and it’s very simple. It’s very cost-effective. I think we put in a website that would help with that. There are a lot of other resources out there to help identify the constellations but it’s just taking time with family to look at one of God’s wonders and relating that into Advent as well.
Chris: Do you have any other activities that are part of the book that you want to share with the listeners just to give kind of a feel of what kind of things they’re going to be finding in there?
Mary: I think of one that I’ve enjoyed is the Feast of St. Lucy. Some of the activities centered on that particular feast day which is December 13th. It’s looking at some of the different traditions from different countries but before St. Lucy, the whole idea of St. Lucy was born in Sicily and as a young person, she was blinded and killed for what she believed, her Christian beliefs and so it’s a custom for the Scandinavian people to ask the eldest daughter to dress up as St. Lucy with a white gown and red sash and a crown of green leaves and candles and to go and wake other members of the family and people in the community with coffee and cake. And so, we included a recipe for St. Lucy’s cake that people could make on that day as a special treat also with the idea for carrying the light to different homes. We suggested the possibility of waiting to turn the lights on your Christmas tree or the lights in your window or your luminaries until the feast of St. Lucy on December 13th. Not to put them right after Thanksgiving but to wait to do that on the 13th and one of the Irish traditions is to place a tall candle in the window where everyone could see and that was to, in the Irish tradition, it was to light the path of the Holy Family. So one of the other things connected would be, for example, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception with Mary’s feast, we suggested that you get together with other women in your family, maybe several generations and bring them together to do some baking for the day or for an afternoon but to use that time to reflect on Mary’s role as a woman and a mother and then to maybe start out with a Scripture passage from *** [00:22:07] that brings out that idea of the spices and the things as far as what Mary really brought to the table and then to use that time for women to get together and talk about what it means to be a woman, what it means to be a mother but to bake those cookies that everybody looks forward to at Christmas time and yet put an Advent twist on it. So those would be a couple of the things.
Ellen: And another is the Jesse tree which to me was that was something that we did when I was a young girl and that my mother instilled in us and so it wasn’t anything new to us and I think one of the surprises to me was that people aren’t aware of the Jesse tree or what a Jesse tree is. Something that I did with my family as they were growing up, my children, and then also did with the school and the parish and our religious education classes and there are a lot of resources out there and our book in particular has the patterns that you would need for the symbols for the Jesse tree and I would point out that our book, the pages are perforated so that you can tear them out and copy them and to cut them out and do whatever you like. But again, the Jesse tree is something that can be adapted to all ages and done in a variety of ways that works best for each family. And it’s a wonderful way to learn about our ancestors and the story of our salvation and how God is present to us and has been present to us. So that’s a really neat tradition that is probably one of my favorites.
Mary: Another possibility would be what we call the Advent blessing book and this is really to kind of center in on how God has so blessed us by sending His Son into the world for us and the concept is that each family would write down three ways that their family has been blessed in the preceding 24 hours and then when those blessings are marked down in the blessing book then each individual in the family would write down three personal blessings. The idea is that by the time we get to Christmas Day depending upon how long Advent is, if it’s 22 days or through 28 days, if let’s say it’s 22 days, we would have like a 132 ways that God has blessed us immensely and that when we come to the liturgy on Christmas Day, we would ask that people would review their blessing book just to see, just in that short period of time, how in 28 days, how God has blessed them so significantly in just a minimum of 168 ways and so we bring that with us with the idea that we recognize how thankful we are and that our obligation is to give thanks and praise for the many ways God has blessed us in each of these weeks of Advent and that we continue to be blessed each week that way. And so it just brings to forefront how fortunate we have been that God is so merciful and that He loves us so much that He sent not only all of these but things that more importantly, He sent His Son into the world. But that project or that activity I spoke to a number of people when we did it for the parish.
Chris: All right, well, we’re running low on time here so were there any final comments that you ladies wanted to make before we closed up?
Ellen: Well, I think if we get one family to think of…look at Advent for the beautiful liturgical season that it is then I would say that we would be successful.
Mary: And I think our hope was by putting this project into book form, that we are able to help other families create Advent traditions or family treasures that they can hand out from generation to generation much like our Christmas traditions. So I think we extend our prayers and our encouragement to keep the season of Advent holy and if Advent in our Homes, family activities is one way to help people do that, we’re just grateful for the opportunity to have this in their hands and we thank the Lord each day for blessing us so immensely with this project.
Chris: Well, thank you very much ladies. It has been great to have you on and we look forward to everyone out there who’s got a copy of this to have a chance to experience Advent in a more full and fruitful way within your families. God bless.
Mary: Thank you and God bless you and have a blessed Advent.
Chris: Yes, ma’am.
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Transcript of Interview with Ellen Becker, Mary Barnes about Advent in the Home. This interview and others like it can be found at http://www.catholicspotlight.com
Listen Now to the audio version of the show.
Advent in the Home is available at The Catholic Company.
http://www.catholiccompany.com/catholic-gifts/3001001/Advent-Home-Activities-Families/