Seasons of the Church Year
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• Advent
• Christmas
• Winter Ordinary Time
• Lent
• Triduum
• Easter
• Summer & Fall Ordinary Time

Liturgical Colors
Liturgical Calendar (2001-2010)
Gospel Readings
 

Advent

The church begins its new year with Advent Sunday, the first Sunday of the Advent season. Advent Sunday always falls on or nearest St. Andrews Day, November 30. Because the secular calendar changes from year to year, Advent Sunday may fall on any day between November 27 and December 3. The season varies from 22 to 28 days in length, ending on Christmas Eve. It always contains four Sundays.

Advent originated as a time of preparation for candidates for church membership prior to their baptism. Between the fourth and seventh centuries, the season varied from three to as many as seven weeks in different parts of Christendom. During this time, Advent came to be seen as a time of preparation for all believers in anticipation of Christmas. The Roman church set the season's length at four Sundays in the sixth century, and in the eleventh century Gregory VII decreed that this would be the standard for the whole church. In the late Middle Ages, penitence was added to the emphasis on preparation.

Advent is above all a time of joyful anticipation; a period of active and prayerful waiting for the coming of the Messiah. The word "Advent" means "coming." It has a threefold meaning for Christians today: the coming of the Lord in human form at Christmas, the coming of the Lord in Word and Spirit, and the coming of the Lord in glory at the end of the age. It is, therefore, a time when the church looks back at the historical event of Christ's nativity, looks around at the revelation of Christ in scripture and experience, and looks ahead to Christ's return at the end of time. It is still thought of as a time of personal introspection and preparation. During Advent, emphasis is placed on the reading of Old Testament prophecies of the coming of the Messiah.

The lighting of an Advent wreath is a familiar custom during this season in Churches and in homes. A wreath is formed, usually of evergreen branches, and adorned with four purple or blue candles. Some churches substitute a pink candle for one of the purple ones. A single white candles sits in the middle of the wreath. On each Sunday in Advent a new purple or red candle is lit until, at last, all four candles are burning. Some churches attach meanings to the four candles, such as hope, peace, love and joy. The increasing light shed by the candles represents the believers' increasing joy as the day of Jesus' coming approaches. On Christmas Day the white candle is lit to proclaim that the Light of the World has come.

The traditional liturgical color for Advent is VIOLET (purple), a color of "not-yet", but also a color of royalty used by princes and kings.  We use it in anticipation of the coming King, Jesus, Our Savior.

Christmas is a season that begins on Christmas Day and lasts for 12 days  on the day of the Baptism of the Lord (hence the title of the popular Christmas song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas"), until January 5 (known in England as "Twelfth Night"). At Christmas we celebrate the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ by the Blessed Virgin Mary.  Christmas is the "Emmanuel-Feast": the presence of God among us; a period of great joy.

The Christmas observance developed relatively late in the history of the Church--early Christians considered the celebration of the Resurrection to be far more important, and both Jesus' birth and baptism were celebrated on Epiphany, January 6. In the fourth century, Roman Christians appropriated a pagan festival day honoring Sol Invictus (The Unconquered Sun) which was celebrated on December 25, the date of the winter solstice. On this the shortest day of the year, the Roman pagans hailed the "rebirth" of the sun, which from that day forward would increasingly rule the day. Christians saw an obvious parallel with the "Sun of Righteousness," a prophetic name for the Messiah. (Because of errors in the secular calendar, the winter solstice occurs in our day on December 21.)

The word "Christmas" is a contraction of "Christ Mass," the name given to the worship service for the day. Christmas is a season of great joy and is marked by reading the story of Jesus' birth, singing Christmas carols and songs, and by giving gifts after the pattern of God's greatest gift to us--His own Son.

Many of the popular customs of the Christmas season, such as the Christmas tree, the Yule log, and the Christmas wreath, have their origin in pagan observances and were adopted and given new significance by Christians.

The liturgical color for the Christmas season is WHITE.

Winter Ordinary Time begins after the Epiphany and ends with the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday.  As the name implies, we celebrate the "ordinary events" of our Christian lives; which are no less important. 

The liturgical color for this season is GREEN, the most "ordinary" or common color, but also the color that symbolizes life, freshness and hope.

Lent is a season lasting forty-six days which begins on Ash Wednesday and ends on the eve of Easter (Holy Thursday Night). It is a time of intense prayer, fasting and preparation for the Pascal Mystery; the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Christ.  Lent is a time of deeper living out our baptism, when we rejected Satan and all his works and empty promises. 

(The name "Ash Wednesday" comes from the practice, continued in some churches today, of sprinkling ashes on the heads of the penitent.) Lent includes Holy Week, the last week of the season. The six Sundays during Lent are exempted, which means that Lent is observed for a total of forty days. This number reminds Christians of the forty days during which Jesus was tempted by Satan in the wilderness following His baptism.

Lent derives from two sources: the fast preceding the Pascha (an early commemoration of both the Passion and the Resurrection), and a period of preparation for candidates for baptism. The fast originally lasted one day but was eventually extended to six. It became the model for Holy Week observances which were separated according to the events of Jesus' last week. The preparation period became the rest of the Lenten season

Some churches continue the tradition of Lenten fasting today. Others encourage believers to make a sacrifice of self-denial in preparation for Easter observances. Lent is characterized as a time of personal reflection and repentance.

The last Sunday of Lent is Palm Sunday, when Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem is commemorated. Churches may be decorated with palm leaves, or worshipers may carry them in to the service as a reminder of the palm branches that were strewn before Jesus as he rode into the city. Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week, which is given to meditation on the events of Jesus' last week before His crucifixion. Thursday of Holy Week is called Maundy Thursday. "Maundy" probably comes from the Latin word "mandatum," which means "commandment." The reference is to Jesus' command that his disciples wash one another's feet. Maundy Thursday is a commemoration of the Last Supper, the Passover meal Jesus celebrated with His disciples the night he was betrayed. It is usually celebrated with Holy Communion. Friday of Holy Week is called Good Friday ("Good Friday" is probably a variant of "God's Friday," the same way we say "good-bye" today instead of "God be with ye"). Good Friday is an observance of Jesus' crucifixion. It is a somber day of reflection and repentance, and some churches remove flowers and all decorative elements from the sanctuary to reflect the mood. Saturday of Holy Week is sometimes called Holy Saturday, and is characterized by watchfulness and preparation.

The liturgical color for Lent is PURPLE (VIOLET). On Good Friday, BLACK is substituted.

Triduum

The Easter season begins with Holy Saturday night and ends with the solemnity of Pentecost. Easter Sunday is the most joyful day of the Christian year. Though every Sunday is considered to be a "little Easter," Easter Sunday itself is the day of days on which Christ's Resurrection is celebrated. It is the oldest of Christian festival days.

St. Paul tells us that if Christ had not risen from the dead, we Christians would be the most pitiable of all people.  But because Christ is risen from the dead, and as He is the first born from the dead, we Christians too, though may die, will live with Christ forever. 

Easter was originally called "Pascha" after the Hebrew word meaning "Passover." ("Easter" is a corruption of the name "Eostre," the name of an Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring who was honored at the vernal equinox.) Easter was originally celebrated as one continuous festival, but in the fourth century it was divided into separate observances of the Resurrection, the Ascension, and Pentecost.

The date of Easter, which determines much of the rest of the church calendar, is fixed according to the Paschal Calendar developed by Dionysius Exiguus, a Scythian monk, in 527. Essentially, Easter falls on the first Sunday following the first full moon falling on or after the first day of spring (March 21). Fixing Easter in such a manner causes it to fall at the same time as the Jewish Passover, since the first Easter coincided with that feast.

Because of Easter's relation to the lunar calendar, many popular seasonal traditions, such as Easter eggs and the Easter bunny, are more closely associated with pagan rites of fertility and spring than with Easter.

The liturgical color for the Easter season is WHITE.

Summer & Fall Ordinary Time is from Pentecost until the solemnity of Christ the King.

Pentecost means "fiftieth day".  In some traditions, the whole season is called Pentecost. In others, Pentecost Sunday is followed by the Trinity season, which begins with Trinity Sunday a week later. In some churches, Pentecost is known as Whitsunday, after the white robes once worn by candidates for baptism on that day.

On Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples while they were gathered in Jerusalem, and they were empowered to preach to people from every nation who had come to Jerusalem for the feast. The Acts of the Apostles records that about 3,000 were added to their number that day. Christians since have considered this event to be the founding of the church.

The model for Pentecost was the Feast of Weeks celebrated by Jews at the end of the grain harvest. Over time, the Feast of Weeks came to be associated with the giving of the Ten Commandments to Moses. The Jews saw this event as the founding of the Jewish nation, and early believers were quick to note a parallel with the founding of the Christian church.

The liturgical color for Pentecost is RED. The liturgical color for the Sundays following Pentecost of Summer & Fall Ordinary Time is GREEN.

Gospel Readings
 

Jn 20:19-23