Calendars, Planning and Time

 Is it just me, or are not-for-profit organizations this year sending wall calendars more than in previous years? They may have their reasons for choosing to lead their funding campaigns with this free gift. But whatever their reason, it got me to thinking.

 

Calendars are used for keeping track of time. Oh sure, clocks do that, too, but calendars measure time on a larger scale. And, understood that way, they are instruments of hope. The very act of hanging up a calendar on the wall of a home or in the office cubicle posits the viewpoint that the days of each month will come to be. I mean, after all, there are those in our day who might be asking, “Who knows if there will be a tomorrow?” The optimist’s view is that keeping track of the days makes for order and planning.

That’s the view I tend to take. And that got me thinking. Do these organizations send these calendars as a way to promote that sense of hopefulness among those on their donor list? Are they really into making sure those donors plan ahead? Or do they have some other intention? Paging through some of the months of those calendars show those organizations working among the most deprived people pictured for each month. Those pages could give the impression that theirs is a campaign of hope. 

I’m not sure just why this calendar thing has come to my attention. Perhaps it’s because I’m coming up on the completion of five years as an octogenarian, making me conscious that I have more time behind me than in front of me. Or maybe it’s just that I know time is at a premium since I seem to have so much accumulation of “things” to get rid of before I depart this world lest I leave someone else to pickup after me. Whatever the reason, I know that time can be my friend rather than my opponent in this process. That’s up to me.

So back to hope: having just completed the season of hope called Advent and the joyful season of Christmas, looking back, looking to the present and looking forward, the calendar-reminder of the measure of time is making me conscious of the three-fold coming of the divine into life. In history, prophetically preparing for the birth of Jesus; in mystery, the each-day awareness of the presence of the divine all around me; in majesty, the future-bent coming of the omega-point toward which all existence tends. 

So keep those calendars coming, folks. I may not be able to use them all in the limited space of home. But hopeful forward-looking reminders are always accepted!