Advent: he comes
December 3rd coming up is the First Sunday in Advent, the first season of the church year, always the four Sundays before Christmas. Advent itself, the word, is from Latin, means “coming” as in “he is coming,” and it refers to the coming of Christ, which can be appreciated in at least three ways:
- Jesus’ first coming at Bethlehem, which all through Advent we anticipate celebrating at Christmas.
- Jesus coming into our hearts and minds and lives as we work through our baptismal journey of “becoming Christ,” returning to the divine image in which God created us in the Beginning.
- Jesus’ second coming which Paul anticipates in his writings and which Jesus himself promises in the gospels, and which our tradition anticipates in the Nicene Creed and the Baptismal Creed.
Our Sunday readings during Advent are different. Advent 1 readings are apocalyptic, anticipating the End of Time. Advent 2 readings, John the Baptist appears as Jesus’ precursor. Advent 3 John the Baptist is about to baptize Jesus. Advent 4 the angel Gabriel appears to Mary, who agrees to conceive, bear, and give birth to the Son of God, Jesus. This year Advent 4 happens to be on Christmas Eve, so we have have Mary in the morning and Jesus that evening.
You will notice some changes for Advent. First, our liturgical color changes from Green to either purple (violet) or Blue; it’s a local choice. Purple is the old penitential color that we got from the Roman Catholic Church centuries ago. Blue came along in my lifetime and seems to have become pretty much the color of choice for Advent. When something like this color change happens we like to find an explanation, which can be called “etiology,” discovering origins, reasons, and they may be historical or mythical. If we aren’t sure why something got started, we may come up with reasons that satisfy. The reason for the Blue hangings in Advent seems to be that the companies who manufacture and sell church hangings needed the business, so they started offering Blue and reminding us that there is some history to Blue, and there is, maybe I’ll talk about that in Sunday School IDK. If you must have an explanation, the Virgin Mary’s color is traditionally Blue, you might say that Blue is in honor and adoration of the BVM, that seems as valid a reason as any.
You may notice a change in the liturgy, the Eucharistic Prayer. The church has a Proper Preface for Advent. Proper means that it’s designated for this particular use, the Preface is the liturgical lead in to the Sanctus, the “Holy, Holy, Holy.” From BCP page 378, our Proper Preface for Advent is
Because you sent your beloved Son to redeem us from sin and
death, and to make us heirs in him of everlasting life; that
when he shall come again in power and great triumph to
judge the world, we may without shame or fear rejoice to
behold his appearing. Therefore, with angels, …
You will notice also that we have an Advent Wreath. It has four candles in a ring, and we mark each Sunday of Advent by lighting the candles in series, a new one each Sunday. The candle colors are optional. In Germany, where apparently the Advent Wreath got started as a devotion in people’s homes, they used red candles. We may use blue, purple or white, and our church uses use blue, though the candle for Gaudete Sunday, the 3rd Sunday of Advent may be pink. That is not for the Virgin Mary (whose color is Blue), It’s because of an ancient tradition in the Roman Catholic Church (from which much of our heritage and tradition comes), that makes Advent 3 “Rejoice Sunday,” easing up on Advent’s old traditional purple penitential nature. I may talk about that in SS too, IDK.
Some advent wreaths have a fifth candle, a white one in the center that may be called the "Christ candle,” that we light at Christmas.
Lo! He comes, with clouds descending,
once for our salvation slain;
thousand thousand saints attending
swell the triumph of His train.
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
God appears on earth to reign.
Ev'ry eye shall now behold Him,
robed in dreadful majesty;
those who set at naught and sold Him,
pierced, and nailed Him to the tree,
deeply wailing, deeply wailing,
shall the true Messiah see.