The "Coming" of Advent

I was originally going to do a four-part series on Advent this year, beginning on December 1st. Then other things got in the way. Our rector, Father Malm, says "We make plans, and God laughs." This is one of those times I gave him a good laugh. But I like the concept of God laughing, so I don't feel so bad about it.

Advent began this year on Sunday, December 1, the fourth Sunday before Christmas. The word itself is Anglicized from the Latin word adventus meaning "coming", and the Latin word is a translation of the Greek parousia, commonly used in reference to the second coming of Christ. Advent is the beginning of our liturgical year and also a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of Jesus’ birth.

The theme of readings and teachings during Advent is to prepare for the second coming while commemorating the first coming of Christ at Christmas. From the 4th century through the Middle Ages, the Advent season was kept as a period of fasting as strict as that of Lent. In some localities it began right after November 11, the feast day of St. Martin of Tours. In some countries this feast was a time of frolic and heavy eating – similar to Mardi Gras -- since the 40-day fast began the next day. In the Anglican and Lutheran churches the fasting rule was later relaxed, with the Roman Catholic Church doing likewise later,but Advent was still kept as a season of penitence. The Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches still hold the tradition of fasting for 40 days before the Nativity Feast.

In many countries, Advent has been marked by interesting popular observances, some of which still survive. In England, especially in the northern counties, there was a custom (now extinct) for poor women to carry around the "Advent images", two dolls dressed to represent Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary. A halfpenny coin was expected from every one to whom these were exhibited, and bad luck was thought to menace the household not visited by the doll-bearers before Christmas Eve. In Normandy, farmers employed children to run through the fields and orchards armed with torches, setting fire to bundles of straw and driving out vermin that would damage the crops. In Rome, the Calabrian pifferari (bagpipe players) entered the city during the last days of Advent to play before the shrines of Mary, because Italian folklore stated that the shepherds played these pipes when they came to the manger at Bethlehem to pay homage to the infant Jesus.

The origins of the Advent calendar come from German Lutherans, who would count down the first 24 days of December physically. This might be as simple as drawing a chalk line on the door each day, beginning on December 1. Some families had more elaborate means of marking the days, such as lighting a new candle or hanging a little religious picture on the wall each day (these pictures became part of some Advent calendars). The candles might also be placed on a structure which was called an "Advent clock" and later “Advent wreath.” In Scandinavia there is a more recent tradition of having a so-called julekalender in the form of a television or radio show, starting on the first of December and ending on Christmas Eve.