Advent begins December 1 until Christmas Day

We Christians hold a great festival during the winter solstice, the shortest days of the year. We call this festival “Christmas,” meaning the “feast of Christ.” It takes several weeks to prepare and several weeks to celebrate.

The weeks of preparation are called Advent — the season of growing darkness before the solstice. The weeks of celebration are called Christmas — the season of growing light after the solstice. Perhaps is comes to something basic: We are children of light.

While the culture has hijacked our holiday, starting it before Halloween and ending it the week before Christmas Day, the symbols of the season are our property, not advertisers’ gimmicks. So it’s important that we keep Advent and Christmas in the church and at home according to our tradition.

And they’re worth keeping. We need Advent. Without it we stop being what we are: a people who are waiting. We need the gospel’s terrifying announcement of the end of time. We need the prophet’s consolations and threats. We learn who we are in the uneasy raving of John the Baptist and in the gentle strength of Holy Mary.

And we need Christmas. We need a festival that runs beyond a single day, beyond a single week. We need time to tell about the journey of the Magi, about the embrace of old Simeon and Anna, about the babbling of water made wine and the leaping Jordan and that glorious voice thundering what we yearn to hear: You are my beloved child!

(above is an excerpt from "Keeping Advent and Chiristmastime" by Peter Mazar ©1996 Archdiocese of Chicago)