Advent Time of Joy and Hope

Advent is a special time in which we are invited to have a vigilant and expectant posture, preparing ourselves for the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. The Liturgy of this time invites us to vigilance, to prayer, to conversion, to opening ourselves to hear and welcome the word of God as did Mary. There are prophetic texts that incite us to change our lives, to hope in the Savior who comes, living today the same spirit of preparation of the people of the Old Testament.

It is a propitious time for penance, but also of joy and hope in living the mystery of the incarnation of God who comes to save us. He makes Himself man in the womb of the Virgin Mary and assumes fully our humanity, like us in all things, except sin, as the Apostle Paul reminds us.

Advent then, is the time of joy and of hope, time of beginning again in the certainty that the Lord is with us!

That upon preparing our house for Christmas, with trees, Nativity scenes, and so many other decorations, may it be around in us the true and only sense of Christmas–God is with us, Emmanuel!

A Merry Christmas is Christmas with Christ

Fátima

Translated from Portuguese