a broken hallelujah by Danielle S. Castillejo
a broken hallelujah
The dark days of winter stretch from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. Cloudy skies force the sun to take cover. I feel alone. Slow home-school mornings compete with news feeds of election season anxiety, and air thick with virus. Although I see the faces of four eager-to-please children, I know the weight of their isolation in my chest.
Jesus, I declare, “Come.”
We are collectively distracted by the empty places in our lives. Hope, Peace, love and Joy wave at me from a distance. Advent’s invitation to participatory expectation in the light of the Savior’s arrival doesn’t fill the hollow spaces of heart or home. Any invitation to attend to their meaning is countered by my explanations to a risen Jesus that this time is different. It’s Broken.
A Christmas’ climactic crescendo is broken, too. No holiday concerts, no festivities with friends. The losses collect in our hearts. My children’s faces reflect familiarity with disappointment and despair I didn’t recognize before this year.
One 11-year-old face reminds me to temper expectation and hope, “Mommy, we don’t know what will happen.” She declares flatly. I sense her acquaintance with loss has drilled deep into her heart.
“I can’t protect her.” I think.
I’ve pulled out Christmas lights, ornaments, ordered a couple of wreaths, and put the checkered red and white table cloth on our table. Fall flowers rest in vases around the house. Scented cinnamon candles burn throughout the day.
Baby Jesus lies swaddled in the manger of our nativity set. I cannot look at his plastic face.
“That’s not him.”
Come, Sweet Jesus.
A weight sits on my hands, crushing their ability to articulate the empty space – the void of Hallelujah. Stilted in silence, longing for resistance, aching for connection, redemption – maybe the adventure of relief. I’ve been here before, trying to harness trauma fragments into a picture that makes sense. Over the past decade, making meaning of trauma layers, a puzzle forming, the edges fill in. A picture of resilience, wholeness, integration – a story written in suffering to counter evil’s marring of God’s image in me.
I have been clinging to this transformation.
Will it hold?
I am a part of a system that is systematically and purposefully fragmenting society, encouraging me to distance myself from connection with others. A traditional consumerism-driven culture which hates hope, denies peace-making, fakes love and advertises shallow joy.
It’s not the pandemic shattering connection.
It is not wearing masks keeping me from seeing you and you from seeing me.
It’s not panic buying and competition for basic necessities making enemies of neighbors.
It’s not an election season riddled with anxiety and anger ripping at faith.
It’s a Jesus who is plastic, who wasn’t born knowing oppression or marginalization. It’s a Jesus who cannot enter brokenness and beauty which leaves me on shaky ground. It’s a Jesus who rejects and shames me. It’s a Jesus cozy with empire that leaves me cold.
Where is the baby Jesus born into the world, shining light, announced by angels, born poor, in the middle of a hostile empire? This is the baby boy I need.
Perhaps, I cannot find him because we sell that baby’s body to a dehumanizing, money-making empire. Jesus lived in an empire that dictated religious norms, tradition, thought, celebration. Sound familiar?
Jesus, I am separated from hope, at war with peace, angry with love, and don’t know if I want joy. I am orphaned from myself. Tiny versions of myself remember cold pews, frozen smiles, superficial Biblical interpretations which didn’t love them – didn’t witnessed them – didn’t allow emotion. There is a sense hopelessness will win, that God has abandoned me, that faith is lost and despair wins.
Jesus, please come.
Jesus.
“I need your physical presence, Jesus, where are you?”
Come, Lord Jesus.
And the Angel said to Mary, (Luke 1:32-33); “32 He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David. 33 And he will reign over Israel[f]forever; his Kingdom will never end!”
I sit at my table, joined by 5 others, this first Sunday of Advent, worshiping. We worship because we cling to fierce hope. It’s a praise of depth, but not always pretty. We sing because we believe. It’s our hallelujah. It’s expectation for his Kingdom that will never end. It’s our praise. It’s our defiant hope against a world of despair. It feels broken this year, but it’s our hallelujah.