<p style="text-align: justify;">This coming Sunday marks the beginning of the Advent season.  The church is four weeks away from celebrating the birth of Christ and the welcoming of the Prince of Peace into the world.  It is a time of anticipation, of expectation, and of longing.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">It is fitting that the first week of Advent symbolizes hope.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The Advent season brings hope in a more just world.  Hope that peace will overcome war.  Hope in reconciling with our fellow man.  Hope that suffering will soon be no more.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Looking at the world today, Advent has never seemed more real.  Tens of thousands of people are in the streets crying out for truth, for righteousness, for justice.  While it cannot be said that the Occupy movement is a religious movement, there is <em>something</em> universal, something spiritual about it.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Critics say that the movement is too varied, leaderless, and directionless to be effective.  While there is some truth that there isn’t a short list of 30-second sound bytes to define what Occupy is about, that is sort of the point.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The people are the message.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">If the Occupy movement was about a singular policy position, as another recent political movement has been, it would have collapsed at the first sign of opposition from the status quo.  Two and a half months later, the voices have only grown stronger.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">People from all across the demographic spectra are coming together for something more powerful than the critics realize.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hope.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hope is the unifying force that binds this diverse group of people, professional and student, young and old, black and white, together in the face of stiff and sometimes violent opposition.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The kind of hope that is birthed from the understanding that we, as a society, are not only responsible to each other but for each other as well.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hope in the promise of ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hope that people see that the Kingdom truly is “at hand”.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hope that justice will be restored.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Hope in a better world yet to come.</p>