At the Beginning of Advent in 2023

The principal focus of Advent is on Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ’s First Coming in time when His Blessed Mother gave Birth to Him painlessly in the cradle in the stable in the cave in Bethlehem. Nevertheless, Holy Mother Church has long taught us that we are to meditate also during the first days of Advent on the Second Coming of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ at the end of time, as well as His "many comings" in our lives, especially by means of Sanctifying Grace and by means of His abiding Presence in the Church Militant here on earth. 

Additionally, we are called to reflect on the fact that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ might come for any one of us at any time at the end of our lives, a moment known to Him alone, which requires us to be ready at all times to face the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords at the moment of the Particular Judgment. Using Advent as a means to recall the First Coming of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ as well as to prepare ourselves for His "intermediate comings" in the life of the Church and at the end of our own lives makes quite a bit of theological sense.

Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was born for us in Bethlehem so as to make it possible for us sinful men to participate in His Easter victory over sin and death. Bethlehem was meant to lead directly to Calvary, and from there to the empty tomb on Easter Sunday. Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's birth for us in time after He spent nine months in the tabernacle of His Blessed Mother's virginal and immaculate womb is supposed to have eternal meaning for each one of our lives.

Everything in our lives is meant to revolve around Him and the standard of His Holy Cross. His birth in Bethlehem was meant to make possible our spiritual regeneration in the baptismal font, at which moment we became incorporated into His Mystical Body as members of His true Church, our mater and our magister, our mother and teacher. Thus, every moment of our lives, bar none, is meant to be defined by the events of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's Incarnation, Nativity, Hidden Years, Public Ministry, Passion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension to the Father's right hand in glory. We are called, therefore, to realize that we are to grow in our knowledge of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ as He has revealed Himself through His true Church so that our love for Him will grow to such a fever pitch that we will seek to serve Him in all aspects of our lives.

This is something that a truly serious Catholic knows without an annual reminder in a publication of Catholic commentary. Granted. However, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ does indeed come like a thief in the night. He comes when we least expect it. Advent thus provides us all a chance to recall that the commemoration of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's Nativity which occurs on Christmas Day and during the Christmas Season liturgically is meant to help us to think supernaturally at all times in the terms given us by the Babe who was born for us to make it possible for us to born unto eternal life at the moment we breathe our last. 

Father Maurice Meschler, S.J., provided an excellent description of the meaning of Advent in The Life of Our Lord: 

We cannot begin our meditations upon the Life of our Saviour, and especially upon the first beginnings of that Life, better than by some thoughts on the season of Advent.  

With Advent a new cycle of the ecclesiastical year begins, under the beautiful sign of the star of Jacob, the founder of the age of peace and joy. There was deep meaning and piety in that old name of the “Christ-month” which our forefathers gave to this season. Just as the sun gilds the darkening days, the hoary tree-tops and frosted windows of winter, so in the mystery of the Incarnation does the Sun of Justice arise, sending his bright and cheery rays into our hearts, awakening our souls to joyous summer activity. A few instructions for the Advent season cannot, therefore, be otherwise than in keeping with meditations upon the Life of Jesus.

1.WHAT THE HOLY SEASON OF ADVENT IS

Advent is a preparation for the coming of the Lord. But there is a threefold coming, or advent of our Lord: the first in human weakness; the second in the souls and hearts of Christians; and the last, in power and glory, to judge the world. These three kinds of advent are very intimately connected with each other. Each is either a preparation for or a result of the others. Christmas reminds us of the true birth of our Lord which once took place, effects His spiritual birth in the hearts of the faithful, and thus prepares us for His future coming to judgment.

Advent is above all the preparation for Christmas, in the same way as the Old Covenant was a preparation for the true coming of the Saviour. This preparation reminds us of two things: first of a great misfortune, and secondly of a still greater happiness.

The misfortune was the fall of our first parents. In these the entire human race fell, estranged itself, without grace or faith, more and more from God, and became a prey to a state of most terrible deterioration, sin and misery. From that one trespass sin steadily progressed till it acquired a veritable empire in heathendom, where Satan ruled the whole world through unbelief, fornication and cruelty, and hurled it from abyss to abyss of temporal misfortune down to despair and eternal damnation. Even with God's chosen people, to whom the inheritance of faith and grace remained, the pressure of the law was heavy, light scanty, assistance weak, apostasy frequent, degeneracy and discontent universal, and the desire for the Redeemer ardent. All classes lay under the tyranny of sin, the passions and death all were shut out from heaven; it was one great migration of the human race to hell. The misery was great, universal and incurable, had God not taken compassion and come down to earth.

But He took compassion on us, and came. And that is the happiness of which Advent reminds us. The more the human race estranged itself from God, the nearer the promised Saviour approached, and prepared a special place for Himself in the human race, in a particular nation, tribe and family, until at last He appeared in visible form, in the fullness of time, and repaired all. He overcame the darkness of unbelief by the light of His doctrine, the passions by His grace and example; He blotted out sin by His atonement, and saved us all from eternal death by His own Death and Resurrection. He set up His kingdom in souls through faith, grace and love, and founded, in opposition to the great empire of Satan, the visible kingdom of His Church – a kingdom which embraces all quarters of the globe and all nations; which includes time and eternity; in which all, freed from the ban of sin and the passions, protected by His law and by His power, enriched by the proper administration of His means of grace, and led by His visible government, are to serve God in justice and holiness, peace and joy, and to journey towards the heavenly kingdom. This kingdom of Christ is among us; its works, prayers and struggles take place in our midst. The holy Advent bells, which are now constantly ringing, bear witness of it. They proclaim it to the whole world, and invite all men to open their hearts and receive it. They proclaim our unhappiness in and through Christ. The holy season of Advent coming before Christmas is like the majestic vestibule leading into old German cathedrals, which is called Paradise. There we are bidden to gaze upon our first parents with the fatal tree of temptation, upon the patriarchs and prophets, telling us of their unsatisfied longings, and pointing trustfully to the coming of our Saviour to be ever with us in the Tabernacle, not in figure, but really and bodily, as the Lamb that once worked and still works their and our redemption.

HOW ADVENT SHOULD BE KEPT.

From this character of the Advent season we may deduce the way in which it should be kept, and this way is exactly the same as that in which the Old Covenant prepared for the actual coming of Christ. It consists of three things. The first is penance. This is appropriate to the remembrance of sin. Sin is always atoned for by penance, and penance must, in fact, prepare the way for all that is good in us, and make God propitious to us. This is the unanimous preaching of the prophets, St. John the Baptist and our Saviour Himself: “Do penance.” Penance itself is interior and exterior. Interior penance consists in contrition for the sins we have committed and resolution not to commit them again, and especially in the use of the holy Sacrament of Penance. Exterior penance is practiced by bodily austerities, by fasting, vigils and abstinence from sensual pleasures. The Church herself comes to our aid in this respect by the prescribed advent fasts, and by her prohibition of marriages during this period. She vests herself in the colour of sorrow at her services, and thereby indicates to us that we should renounce vain pleasures, and we do during an obligatory time of mourning. Everyone must, then, see if he cannot put a restraint on his indulgence in earthly delights and sensual pleasures.

The second characteristic of the Advent solemnity is recollection, retirement and prayer. Everything at this season invites us to retire within ourselves. Nature recollects herself as it were, and gazes into her mysterious depths; only in the heavens above, where the world of stars unfolds its splendor, is life to be found, which draws our thoughts away from this earth and upwards to heaven and eternity. Advent is like a solemn vigil before a great feast. The Church too prays, more at this time, and all earnest souls are lost in loving, devout contemplation of the mysteries of the Advent and Incarnation of Jesus. There they build their tabernacles. The mysteries of His youthful life are like a rose of Jericho. Throughout the year it shrivels up and looks very insignificant. Now, in Advent, moistened with fresh water, it begins to show signs of life, blossoms, and becomes a familiar adornment of the room at Christmas. So it is with the youthful life of Jesus. Now, in Advent, fostered by loving meditation, it blossoms anew, much seeter and more beautiful than the rose of Jericho, and exhales a perfume by which every sick heart is healed of sorrow and distress. St, Paul says in the Epistle of the first Sunday in Advent that we must “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Rom xiii, 14) This then, must be our occupation during Advent – meditation upon the Incarnation, and many prayers and intercessions for the salvation of the world, the conversion of sinners, the necessities of the Church, and the realisation of God's intention in the institution of the holy season of Advent.

The third thing that we must do in Advent is to long and to trust. The patriarchs of the Old Covenant are in this especially our models. The coming Redeemer was the object of their faith, hope, and desire. From heart to heart, from mouth to mouth passes this longing, and the loud cry rings down the whole line of patriarchs and prophets –  “O come!” (Ps. Lxxix 3.) “O that Thou wouldst rend the heavens!” (Isa lxiv. 1.) “Drop down dew ye heavens, from above, and let the clouds rain the just.” (Isa xlv. 8.) With what confidence and happy trustfulness they await Him! Yes, for they had the divine promise. “God Himself will come and save you” (Isa. Xxxv. 4.) And the more intense their longing grew, the more emphatically did God, on His side, answer by His sure promise and encourage them to confidence and joy. It is especially from the prophet Isaias, the prophet of trust in the Redeemer, that the Church in her daily Hours takes the words of longing and confidence. At this season the Alleluia is never absent from the songs of the Church, for it is a season of longing and jubilant hope. The subject of this confidence of the Church is the constant fulfillment of the effects, of our Saviour's first advent, as seen in ourselves. “To Thee, O Lord, have I lifted up my soul . . . I shall not be confounded!” (Ps. Xxiv. 1.2.) Thus the Mass of the first Sunday in Advent begins; and with these words the key-note for the entire Advent season is struck.

So, then, penance, prayer, and trustful longing! Let everyone now reflect as to what he can and will do in this respect.

WHAT MOTIVES WE HAVE FOR SPENDING ADVENT IN THIS MANNER

There are both interior and exterior motives.

The interior motives spring from the three different advents of our Lord, which stand in most intimate relation to one another. – The first motive is the greatness of the benefit which accrues to us in the first, actual coming of our Saviour, of which Christmas reminds us. It is “a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into this world” (I. Tim. I. 15). How fitting it is to think of it, and to reflect that He Himself, came to save us, that He did it at the cost of so many sacrifices, ad that His coming brought us so many and such great blessings! What should we be with Him? Would life be worth living, if He had not redeemed us? Is it not a joy to be a human being, now that the goodness and loving-kindness of God has appeared and we look for the blessed hope and coming of the glory of our great God and Saviour? (Titus ii. 11.13.) And yet how few think of this goodness and these benefits! Is it not meet and right that we should pay for others also the debt of thanks to our loving Redeemer? – The second motive is the spiritual coming of our Lord, which is now to take place in our hearts by our appropriation of the graces of the redemption. How abundantly this redemption is offered us! All that the first coming brought to the world stands at our disposal. We can appropriate it just as well and as truly as the shepherds, the Magi, Simeon and Anna, and all those who have believed in Christ and sanctified themselves by this faith. The blood of Christ washes away our sins now, just as it once did those of St. Mary Magdalen; faith and the peace of Christ, and the happiness of finding Him, fall to our lot just as to that of the good, simple shepherds and the Magi; we can fold Christ in our arms as Simeon and Anna did; He can be born in our hearts spiritually, just as in the flesh He was once born in the womb of the Blessed Virgin. These are not pious opinions and imaginations, but truths and facts. The mystery of the Incarnation and Redemption is a reality, it takes place, only in another form and under other circumstances. And is not the need of redemption just as great and urgent as at the time of Christ's coming? Is there not sin of every kind, passions as great still, and is there not a whole army of temporal evils? Do not unbelief and heathenism exist? Does not the heathenism of the past still hod sway over the greater part of the earth's surface? And, in the midst of Christendom, has not a modern heathenism developed, which would like to deprive the world of the grace and comfort of faith in Christ, and throw her 1900 years backwards into heathen times and customs! How sorely our world needs redemption and peace in Christ, and how easily it might have it! – The third motive is the future coming of our Lord to judgment, for which we must prepare ourselves by the spiritual reception of Him into our hearts, and by the use of the graces of redemption which are offered to us in the Christmas mystery. Does not the world, do not we need to be prepared for this last advent of our Lord? Would that the Advent bells might carry this truth out into the whole world, and arouse all men to bear a hand in the building up of Christ's kingdom by prayer and penance!

The exterior motives are to be found in the example of all good Catholics and of the Church, which observes from time immemorial the custom of preparing by prayer and penance for the coming of our Lord, in order thus to apply the grace of redemption to all ages and generations. The Church's office in the world is to pray, to do penance and to strive for the advancement of Christ's kingdom, just as the Church of the Old Covenant did before her. For this reason she takes from the lips of the prophets and saints of old the accents of longing and desire of the Redeemer, and offers them to God in the name of the whole human race. They are the same prayers and sighs that went up to the Saviour of the world before His actual coming in the flesh. Yes, the Church regards the mystery of the Incarnation and Nativity of Christ as though it were to take place again and as if this event were now impending. “Let us adore the approaching King  . . . The Lord is near, let us adore Him,” she says in her Office. Now, she hopes, now she rejoices, then she fears lest our sins should delay His coming; in short she gives herself up to the contemplation of the mystery of her Divine Spouse with all her loving heart, with all her thoughts and endeavours.

We too will keep Advent in the same manner, and follow in the step of our Mother when she teaches us to meditate upon the mysteries of the Incarnation and at the same time asks of our hearts a little sacrifice for our own good and for the comfort of the poor world. Who knows if we shall live to see another Advent, if this be not the last, and if we may not soon meet as our Judge the Saviour whom we are about to meet with joy as our Redeemer! (Father Murice Maurice Meschler, S.J., The Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, The Son of God, in Meditations, Freiburg Im Breisgau 1928 Herder & Co., Publishers to the Holy Apostolic See, pp. 22-23.)

As Father Mescheler noted, Advent is a time of penance and recollection, not a time of over-indulgence, partying and nonstop shopping. We cannot permit our Catholic lives to be shaped the marketing schemes of merchants and bankers, shylocks who are eager to relieve Catholics of their money and to steep them in mountains of high-interest debt as they, the shylocks, blot out the Holy Name of Our Lord Jesus Christ in favor of the "holiday" season.

The liturgical seasons of Advent and Christmas are not about maudlin sentimentality. They are given us by Holy Mother Church to help us focus more carefully on our need for the truths of the true Faith in every aspect of our lives. We cannot view any of the events of the day as though the Incarnation and the Nativity of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity can be ignored as irrelevant in the course of our daily lives. There is no secular, religiously indifferentist way to view problems that have their remote origin in Original Sin and their proximate origin in the aftermath of the Protestant Revolt and the rise of Freemasonry. It is only a frank and unapologetic defense of the truths of the Catholic Faith, expressed full-throated and with never a hesitation about proclaiming the Holy Name of the Divine Redeemer, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, that can help others to see the harm of a world that goes about its business as though it is possible to speak about current events without once thinking of the Deposit of Faith that has been entrusted whole and entire solely to the Catholic Church. Thus, Advent is meant to be used by us to eschew human respect in all its forms and to speak and to write and to act as Catholics no matter what it will cost us in terms of “success” in this passing world. 

Making a good Advent requires as much planning and dedication as it takes to make a good Lent. Although Advent does not involve the degree of austere penances called for in Lent, it is a penitential season, which is why purple is used as the color of the liturgical vestments. Our voluntary renunciation of self during Advent is a way of reminding us that we are to be filled more completely with Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and Savior Jesus Christ with each passing day.

Plans are always made to welcome a new child into a family. We must make plans during Advent to give a fit welcome to Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, especially by making room for in the inns of our hearts, by withdrawing from the spirit of the world and spending more time in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament and to the Mother of God. Keeping a good Advent involves, of course, keeping time with Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in His Real Presence, if this is at all possible where you live, praying Our Lady's Most Holy Rosary daily, and getting to Confession once a week if one has access to true priests. It is also important to keep the practice of the Christmas Novena, which begins the Feast of Saint Andrew, November 30 and runs through the Fourth Sunday of Advent and the Vigil of Christmas (see the Appendix A below).  

Preparing to commemorate the Nativity of Our Divine Redeemer also involves reminding ourselves that the events of Bethlehem are meant to change the entirety of our lives forever. We are Christ's. Our eyes are the eyes of Christ. Our ears are the ears of Christ. Our mind is the mind of Christ. We are called to love with the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, to which we are called to be totally consecrated. We are called during Advent to give concrete expression to all of this by withdrawing from the commercialism of what has become the "holiday season." It is especially important for Catholics to keep Advent simple and penitential in this regard.

There is no need for us to "prove" our love for our children and relatives and friends by spending all kinds of money on gifts for them. Why do we want to support the truly horrific evils of corporate America, most of whose stores prohibit any mention of the word Christmas? This is but a secular continuation, common in both capitalist and socialist countries, of the old Calvinist practice, exhibited by the Puritans in North America in the Seventeenth Century, of outlawing the public celebration of Christmas.

After all, Christmas means "Christ Mass." The wretched lot of sorry people who followed John Calvin's multiple heresies could accord no recognition at all to that which they hated so fiercely, Christ's Mass, the Holy Sacrifice in which Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is made Incarnate anew in His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, under the appearances of bread and wine. Christmas had to be banished from view, "Thanksgiving" made into a secular feast. The same is true today, is it not? Why subsidize these haters of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, no less go greatly into debt to participate in their evil ways?

Let me reiterate this point so as to make myself very clear: The corporate robber barons of today, concerned only about the bottom line, cater to adherents of Talmudic Judaism and of a Communist holiday, Kwanza, and the various demonic practices of Eastern "mysticism."

Why support them?

Why?

Why shop in their stores?

Why reward them with our business?

Why complicate a season in which our principal focus must be on preparing our souls for a worthy commemoration of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's Nativity in Bethlehem by spending time and money on the passing things of this world?

It is far, far better to send Mass cards to our friends, making it clear that we are having the Immemorial Mass of Tradition said for them and their families. There is no better Christmas gift to give to another than a Mass card or a spiritual bouquet of Masses. Our relatives may not appreciate the gift of Masses we choose to give them; however, their mystification at what we give them provides us with more merit in Heaven while at the same time they benefit from the graces which flow forth from the Masses we have arranged to have said for them.

We can combat the secularism and paganism that are the products of the Judeo-Masonic world of Modernity when we have to venture out into the world to buy our groceries and other needed supplies by correcting merchants who wish us a "happy holiday" by wishing them a "Blessed Advent," reminding them that we must be prepared at all times for the Coming of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ and Saviour Jesus Christ into our lives by means of Sanctifying Grace and at the moment of our Particular Judgments. We must go out of our ways to proclaim the Holy Name in public places.

Want to keep a simple and relatively commercial-free Advent and still get gifts for family and friends?

Shop at online Catholic book and gift stores run by traditional Catholics and/or located in or near completely traditional Catholic chapels that make no concessions to conciliarism or to the nonexistent legitimacy of the false shepherds of its counterfeit church.

Make your own gifts for your family and friends. Someone is going to find his or her niche by designing and manufacturing bedding and clothing with the images of the saints on them. Someone is going to find his or her niche by creating good Catholic games for children and adults to play together. We can recapture the spirit of the Middle Ages by making simple gifts and making them well for the honor and glory of God, giving all of our efforts to Him through Our Lady's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart.

Other than liturgical feast days, such as the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary on December 8 and Our Lady of Guadalupe, the Patronness and Empress of the Americas, on December 12, Advent is not a time of celebration. It is not the time for partying whatsoever. We should politely decline all invitations to attend parties during Advent. Too bad if your boss does not understand. Better to keep the penance of the season than to please man and the mammon he has to offer us.

The principal of a fully traditional Catholic school some years ago now explained some basic Catholic teachings about Advent in a letter sent home parents to explain why the school would not be participating in a tree lighting ceremony in a nearby park:

This letter is to inform you that the students will not be participating in the annual tree-lighting ceremony.

The ceremony, scheduled for December 1st, is to be secular in tone, featuring such songs as "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" and "Frosty the Snowman," so as to be politically correct by modern standards. We, as faithful Catholics, do not condone the premature celebration of the feast of Christmas itself, nor do we approve of the purely secular "holiday" celebrations which the world in general promotes as a "Christ-less" alternative to Christmas. Therefore, we cannot participate in the planned festivities on [the] Green.

The mind of Our Holy Mother the Church must be our rule of action. The Church would have us observe Advent. Although, to be sure, Advent is not another Lent, as regards fasting and other penitential practices, nevertheless it is a reverent hush, so to speak, during which we recollect ourselves and joyfully anticipate the glorious feast of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ's Nativity. When Christmas arrives, we shall celebrate it all the better for having piously observed Advent.

We must not allow ourselves to get swept up by the spirit of these worldly times. The spirit of the Catholic Church is not one of yielding to human respect and emotionalism, or of compromising with the world. "Peace on Earth; good will to men" is not synonymous with "Peace on Earth to men of good will."

Just sound Catholic teaching. We can make no exceptions to the spirit of the season of Advent. And we need not be overly concerned about the world around us. We do not need to rush out to malls. We do not need to do what others are doing. And isn't it about time that we withdrew from the popular culture once and for all? Why does it come as a surprise to some Catholics that Hollywood is getting bolder and bolder in producing overtly anti-Catholic motion pictures?

There is a solution to this: don't go to movie theatres. Would Our Blessed Lord and Saviour plop down the price of admission to enter into places where His Holy Name and His Holy Faith and His Most Blessed Mother are blasphemed on a regular basis and and where the very thing, sin, that caused Him to suffer during His Passion and Death and wounded His Most Blessed Mother's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart is heralded so as to incite more and more people to sin and/or to persist in their lives of unrepentant sin? If He would not do so, then why do you? Why? There is no good reason to enter a movie theatre or to turn a television set. Throw out your television. You will never miss it. Saints got to Heaven for centuries without motion pictures and watching television. So can you. Indeed, how much time is wasted on the popular culture that could be devoted to personal sanctity, such as praying more Rosaries each day? (And this is from a reformed television addict of the 1950s and 1960s and early 1970s and a reformed news addict from the 1950s through the 1990s).

Moreover, Advent is not the time for the playing of Christmas music. Christmas begins on December 25 (anticipated with First Vespers on December 24, obviously) and runs through the Epiphany (which has its own Octave in the calendar of Tradition) and concludes with the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary on February 2. That is the time for the playing of Christmas music, not before. 

Advent is a time of withdrawal from worldly concerns, something that is particularly important for parents with young children to teach them, shielding them as much as possible from all of the commercial and pagan efforts to entirely obliterate the true meaning of the period before Christmas from public view and the consciousness of men and women. A child who learns to make a spiritual Advent early in life will have a healthy immunization from the sort of materialistic expectations which most children come to have. Children must associate Christmas with the birth of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And this means that there must be no mention of the paganization of Saint Nicholas, the great foe of Arius and Arianism whose feast is celebrated on December 6, into the image of "Santa Claus." Our children must be taught to anticipate the Coming of the Nativity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, not the coming of a fictional gift-giver.

The first day of the Christmas Octave, December 25, should be celebrated with joy, mindful, of course, that the most important gift God the Father could give us, His Son, was bestowed upon us on Christmas Day. We must do nothing which in any way detracts from our commemoration of this tremendous gift, which made possible our passageway to eternity. And one of the best ways to help us keep our focus during Advent is by reading Dom Prosper Gueranger's The Liturgical Year each day during Advent and the Christmas season (which is a good way to start reading it for the entire year).

Advent belongs to Our Lady. It is her time of waiting to give birth to her only Son, conceived by the power of the Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, which we commemorate during Advent. We must keep very close to her in the days leading up to Christmas. Although we are called to love Our Lady and to honor her every day of our lives, offering up to her Immaculate Heart all that we suffer in this life as her consecrated slaves, Advent reminds us that Our Lady was chosen from all eternity to be the singular vessel of devotion through which the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity would assume a perfect human nature with which to redeem us on the wood of the Holy Cross.

As noted before special periods of devotion to Our Lady are to be fostered, especially on December 8, which is the Feast of her Immaculate Conception, December 12, which is the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the Patroness of the Americas and of the Unborn, and in the eight days immediately before Christmas (December 17-24), the days of the "O Antiphons" in the Divine Office. 

Indeed, Our Lady appeared to Juan Diego in Advent, leaving him an image of her on his tilma as she appeared carrying the Unborn Baby Jesus. We need to pray to her so that she will her impress the image of the purity and love of her Divine Son on our immortal souls so as to celebrate Advent in such a way as to realize that we must be prepared for Christ's coming into our lives at all times, especially during Holy Mass and at the end of our lives. And it is by cleaving to the Immemorial Mass of Tradition, which begins with a priest addressing God at the foot of the altar and ends with the Gospel of the Incarnation, as it is offered by true bishops and true bishops in the Catholic catacombs where no concessions are made to conciliarism or to its false shepherds that we can come to see the absolute necessity of making no compromise of any kind at any time for any reason with a world that is just as hostile to and unprepared for the Coming of Christ now as it was two millennia ago.

With prayers for a blessed Advent, I remain,

Sincerely yours in Christ the King through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary,

Thomas A. Droleskey, Ph.D.

O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee!

Viva Cristo Rey! Vivat Christus Rex! 

The Christmas Novena on the Feast of Saint Andrew (said fifteen times daily until Christmas Day)

Hail and blessed be the hour and moment in which the Son of God was born of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in piercing cold.  In that hour vouchsafe, O my God! to hear my prayer and grant my desires, through the merits of Our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of His Blessed Mother. Amen.

The Novena in Honor of the Immaculate Conception (courtesy of The Apostolate of Our Lady of Good Success), to be prayed from November 29 to December 7)

O IMMACULATE Virgin! Mary, conceived without sin!

Remember, thou wert miraculously preserved from even the shadow of sin, because thou wert destined to become not only the Mother of God, but also the mother, the refuge, and the advocate of man; penetrated, therefore, with the most lively confidence in thy never-failing intercession, we most humbly implore thee to look with favor upon the intentions of this novena, and to obtain for us the graces and favors we request.

Thou knowest, O Mary, how often our hearts are the sanctuaries of God, Who abhors iniquity. Obtain for us, then, that Angelic purity which was thy favorite virtue, that purity of heart which will attach us to God alone, and that purity of intention which will consecrate every thought, word, and action to His greater glory. Obtain also for us a constant spirit of prayer and self-denial, that we may recover by penance that innocence which we have lost by sin, and at length attain safely to that blessed abode of the Saints, where nothing defiled can enter.

O Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.

LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY

Lord, have mercy
Christ, have mercy
Lord, have mercy.
Christ, hear us.
Christ, graciously hear us.

God, the Father of Heaven, have mercy on us.
God the Son, Redeemer of the World, have mercy on us.
God the Holy Ghost, have mercy on us.
Holy Trinity, One God, have mercy on us.

Holy Mary, pray for us.
Holy Mother of God, pray for us.
Holy Virgin of Virgins, pray for us.
Mother of Christ, pray for us.
Mother of Divine Grace, pray for us.
Mother most Pure, pray for us.
Mother most Chaste, pray for us.
Mother Inviolate, pray for us.
Mother Undefiled, pray for us.

Mother most Amiable, pray for us.
Mother most Admirable, pray for us.
Mother of good Counsel, pray for us.
Mother of our Creator, pray for us.
Mother of our Savior, pray for us.
Virgin most Prudent, pray for us.
Virgin most Venerable, pray for us.
Virgin most Renowned, pray for us.
Virgin most Powerful, pray for us.
Virgin most Merciful, pray for us.
Virgin most Faithful, pray for us.
Mirror of Justice, pray for us.
Seat of Wisdom, pray for us.
Cause of our Joy, pray for us.
Spiritual Vessel, pray for us.
Vessel of Honor, pray for us.
Singular Vessel of Devotion, pray for us.
Mystical Rose, pray for us.
Tower of David, pray for us.
Tower of Ivory, pray for us.
House of Gold, pray for us.
Ark of the Covenant, pray for us.
Gate of Heaven, pray for us.
Morning Star, pray for us.
Health of the Sick, pray for us.
Refuge of Sinners, pray for us.
Comforter of the Afflicted, pray for us.
Help of Christians, pray for us.
Queen of Angels, pray for us.
Queen of Patriarchs, pray for us.
Queen of Prophets, pray for us.
Queen of Apostles, pray for us.
Queen of Martyrs, pray for us.
Queen of Confessors, pray for us.
Queen of Virgins, pray for us.
Queen of all Saints, pray for us.
Queen conceived without Original Sin, pray for us.
Queen assumed into Heaven, pray for us.
Queen of the most Holy Rosary, pray for us.
Queen of Peace, pray for us.

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, spare us, O Lord!.
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, graciously hear us, O Lord!
Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

V. Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God.
R. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ. 

Let us pray.

Grant, we beg Thee, O Lord God, that we Thy servants, may enjoy lasting health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of the Blessed Mary, ever Virgin, be delivered from present sorrow and enter into the joy of eternal happiness. Through Christ Lord. R. Amen.

During Advent Let us pray.

O God, Thou hast willed that, at the message of an Angel, Thy Word should take flesh in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary; grant to Thy suppliant people, that we, who believe her to be truly the Mother of God, may be helped by her intercession with Thee. Through the same Christ Our Lord. R. Amen.