Wishing in the Darkness of Advent

Each December, there is an important matter in my family that must be settled. Which Christmas movies are we prioritizing? I personally will not let December 25 pass until we have watched the original 1966 How the Grinch Stole Christmas. My wife’s side of the family, on the other hand, are die-hard It’s a Wonderful Life people.

So much of this season is fueled by nostalgia, but that has not stopped the American commercialized machine from doing what it does. New Christmas media keeps getting churned out, and plenty of it is forgettable, of course. Yet here I am writing in an attempt to tell you that a new animated Christmas movie might just be the best thing you come across this Advent season.

Netflix has produced two short films inspired by the children’s book Angela and the Baby Jesus by Frank McCourt, the author of the famous memoir Angela’s Ashes. Both of these films are stunning. The first, Angela’s Christmas (2017), follows Angela (McCourt’s mother) as a child living in an impoverished state reminiscent of the depiction of Limerick, Ireland in Angela’s Ashes. I was so struck by the simple beauty of this little tale—which follows Angela as she steals her local church’s baby Jesus statue in an attempt to keep him warm—that I made an entire video essay about it. The way it contrasts innocence and light with suffering and darkness to me evoke many of the paradoxes and mysteries at the heart of Christ’s nativity.

Then in 2020, Netflix released a sequel entitled Angela’s Christmas Wish. I was ready for another cheap knock-off capitalizing on the success of its Emmy-winning predecessor. But there I was last year at the end of the film, watching it with my kids, with tears in my eyes. The sequel has many of the same lovable qualities as the first film. Its story is simple but moving. It beautifully captures the innocence and optimism of childhood. And its basic themes—faith, hope, and family—could not be more universal. But like its predecessor, I find Angela’s Christmas Wish to offer some surprisingly in-depth insights when it too is viewed as a decidedly Christmas film. In fact, the structural patterns that guide this film map on strikingly well to many foundational aspects of the Advent season.

A Descent into Darkness

A brilliant move made by director Damien O’Connor is opening both films with the image of a single candle. Angela’s Christmas is full of light-in-darkness imagery, and the candle in this film parallels the persistent light of Angela’s kindness in her dark world (as well as the Christ Child, of course). Angela’s Christmas Wish begins two years prior to Angela’s Christmas, and diverging from the first film, the candle at the opening is quickly blown out. As Angela’s mother extinguishes the candle, she snatches a toy sheep from young Angela’s hands, which belongs to the nativity scene the candle had been illuminating.

Both of these images—extinguishing a flame and taking away a lamb—hint at an important aspect of Advent. We can call it a loss of innocence and hope, or, better yet, a descent into darkness. These two images, however, only set the stage for the next scene, which is most pivotal. With the context established from the previous film that the family lived for a period of time without their father, young Angela and her family walk somberly to the shipyard to see off their father, who is traveling from Ireland to work in Australia. Angela waves unknowingly at her father, as a suffocating mist swallows the boat. It is the most key moment of lost innocence, a loss of wholeness for Angela and her family.

It is no coincidence that the Advent season coincides with the darkness of the winter solstice. Neither is it a coincidence that many of the earliest depictions of Christ’s nativity—carried through until today in Orthodox icons—place the Christ Child in the darkness of a cave, lying in a manger strangely reminiscent of a stone coffin. Christ’s coming is not a charming and picturesque moment, as it has often been imagined. It is the ultimate descent. That which is highest took on what is lowest, eventually “trampling down death by death” as the ancient troparion says.

Darkness is a part of our experience during Advent as well. In the days leading up to Christmas, Christians link ourselves to the people of God before the arrival of Christ, living in their own darkened and broken reality. And we, in a similar fashion, meditate during Advent on the continued brokenness of our world. This is analogous to Angela’s world as it is presented in these opening moments. Advent starts with a lamentation of loss, and so does this film.

Waiting in the Dark Valley

As the mist clears, time moves forward two years, and more candles appear. This time, they are votive candles in a church that are being lit by Angela’s mother. Employing another image that is characteristic of Advent, her mother is doing what Christians have done throughout history during this season: waiting in faithful vigil for a return. The term Advent means “coming” or “arrival,” and just as the Christian story is predicated on the “comings” of Christ and a return of what has been lost, the plot arc of Angela’s Christmas Wish becomes predicated on a similar anticipation of the coming home of their father. Angela’s family, like the people of God past and present, have been forced into an undefined period of waiting, in an incomplete, fractured state.

From here, we follow Angela and her attempts to cling onto hope—brought beautifully to life by the motifs of the toy sheep she carries and her repeated song that insists she is saving a place in her heart for her father. This can be easily compared to the hope that is a central focus of the Advent season. Faith is also a key theme in the film, captured well in the repeated idea of wishing and Angela’s wish of the return of her father. This can be likened to the faith required of people waiting and wishing for the coming of Christ.

But Advent is not all about hope and fulfilled promises. It’s also a month of shrouded complexity. Echoing the full scope of the emotions of this season, there is also a sense of frustration and impatience among the siblings. Much of the film follows Angela and her brother and their many desperate attempts to get to Australia and usher in the restoration they are hoping for. These frustrations, then, quickly give birth to doubt and eventually to despair.

The waiting during Advent is also not meant to be passive. Properly understood, our waiting should be transformative. Christians meditate on God’s faithfulness so that we too might be faithful to God, that our hearts might be aligned with the heart of God. Many prayers and Christmas songs even speak of the Christ Child being born in our hearts. Consider John the Baptist preparing the way for the coming Christ. His message was not to wait passively. His message was repent—correct your hearts and motivations—for the Kingdom of God is at hand.

This proper alignment of the heart is illuminated by the film’s other central plot element: the parable told by Angela’s mother of the king and the pauper who are each granted a wish by the genie. The lesson taught by the king being ultimately dissatisfied by his wish for gold and the pauper being fully satisfied by his wish for happiness is that we should focus our hearts and hopes on what is most important, on what is most truly fulfilling.

We see Angela go through a similar internal journey in the film. It is, after all, about her Christmas wish. The “Christmas surprise” of a fancy new doll that Angela mentions at the beginning, in her mind, is already an extravagant thought. She dreams with giddiness and hopes that this is what her mother is planning. But along the way, she realizes that even this “wish” is trivial, in comparison to the hope of her father’s homecoming and her family’s return to wholeness. Embodying the lesson of the parable(and mirroring the proper journey of our hearts during Advent) she goes from selfishly wishing for a toy to realizing what is truly missing from all of their lives—what is truly worthy of her wishes.

A Triumphant Advent

As the film reaches its climax, Angela clutches a picture of her father to her chest, and she wishes with the prayerful earnestness that only a child can muster. “I wish, I wish, I wish,” she implores in childlike faith. And when hope seems lost, when darkness and despair seem to have overcome the light, the return of their father, the true “Christmas surprise,” is breathtaking. I still cry every time.

I have no evidence that director Damien O’Connor intended these parallels, but this is the moment that shines most brightly to me. The deepest wishes of the family are fulfilled. It is an extravagance beyond their wildest dreams. It is the joy of Christmas morning—in the fullest sense. And their father returns, of all days, on Christmas Eve.

Their father’s return is, of course, transformative as well. Echoing the scope of the Christian narrative again, their family is restored to the idealized state that was lost, and there is a ripple effect of restoration around them. For example, the unengaged father of Dorothy, Angela’s new friend, is urged into a renewed sense of purpose. After Angela’s family visits their home, he realizes the important things he had been neglecting, which then restores Dorothy’s family to a sense of wholeness once again.

There is even a quick moment at the end of the film when the children gift their neighbor McGinty’s baby cow a pair of socks. Earlier, McGinty tells the kids that he has been praying for the cow’s mother during her birth because she was not looking well. These prayers, too, are answered upon their father’s return, and we see the baby cow healthy, donning his bright red socks. I like to imagine McGinty’s cow as a stand-in for all of creation. As is so beautifully captured in every nativity scene, the glorious Advent of our Lord draws all—from every walk of life imaginable—to the table of extravagant redemption.

Whether it was intentional or not, I’m continually surprised at how many of the core patterns of the Advent season are played out in this seemingly simple children’s film. Needless to say, Angela’s Christmas Wish has risen to the top of my list of essential Christmas movies. It’s entertaining and heartwarming, but beyond that, it is full of timely reminders for those of us seeking to truly participate in the reality of the full Advent story. I’m sure we who engage in our own Advent vigils are still learning to be patient in the dark valley, to lean into the transformative power of true Christian hope, and to wish with the faith of a child when darkness seems to overtake the light.