Learning about the this year has year has really changed my perspective of Christmas! If you’re like me, you’ve always assumed the offical Christmas Season is what is happening throughout December as streets are decorated, people shop for gifts and various Christmas-themed events pop up. But if you look at the Christian calendar, early to mid December is not technically not Christmas at all, it’s Advent, the period of preparation for Christmas. Advent is every day starting four Sundays before Christmas. Churches offer special Sunday services during this time to help observants prepare spiritually for the arrival of Jesus Christ. Families sometimes light candles on wreaths at home each Sunday and give small treats to children to mark each day before Christmas.
Another fact about the Christian calendar that may be surprising is that Christmas is not one day, it is Twelve Days () from December 25 to January 5. Traditionally, Christmas dinners, concerts, dances, parties, etc. would happen throughout this period, not before. Commercialization and modern lifestyles have led many to move festivities to earlier in December, something that seems to have both advantages and downsides, including in terms of finding connection and community events between Christmas and New Year's Day.
I recently learned from a storyteller at the fascinating that traditionally in Quebec, the Christmas season started on Christmas Eve (December 24), when shops would reveal their Christmas window displays and people would buy gifts. In practice, the Christmas season lasted from then until February. Smoothed-out, snow-covered land and frozen bodies of water provided relatively smooth, efficient routes for travel between villages in the era before modern road systems and bridges. In summer, roads were muddy, bumpy and very inefficient for travel, but in winter, the use of sleighs on the snow, as well as having much less work to do, made travelling to visit extended family and friends easier. This led many past Quebeckers to embrace winter and Christmas season as a joyful, festive time they looked forward to—truly one of the best times in the year because of the rest and connection it provided. Christmas was a time for gathering around the fire, telling stories, and strengthening relationships.
The Christian liturgical calendar runs throughout the entire year, not just during Christmas. It all centers on events in the life of Jesus Christ, and it is coordinated with the solar calendar. The day after the 12th day of Christmas is Epiphane, which celebrates the visit of the Wise Men to the Christ Child or the Baptism of Jesus depending on the tradition. After that there is a period of “Ordinary time” until Lent (which starts in February or March in Western Christianity), the period of spiritual preparation for Holy Week and Easter. After Pentecost, the calendar returns to Ordinary Time. There are some minor holidays during the Ordinary Time periods.Â
Major Christian holidays include Christmas, Good Friday and Easter (in the spring, dated according to Jewish Passover), and Pentecost. There are a few minor holidays too. Christians aren’t commanded in their scriptures to celebrate any holidays and people don’t need to follow it or even know about it to be Christians, but the liturgical calendar can adds a meaningful spiritual rhythm to life. it this way:
“We begin in the rising plain of Advent, which leads us to the top of the celebrative pinnacle of Christmas. Then, after a month of travel through the fertile grasslands of “ordinary time,” we enter the parched desert of Lent in which our thirst for God is magnified. Holy Week guides us through the tortuous geography of Jesus’ last week, culminating in the dark cave of Holy Saturday. On Easter morning, the sun breaks forth with glorious light, and we are filled with awe as we gaze upon the towering mountain of God’s victory over death. Throughout the season of Eastertide, the world seems brighter, more alive than ever before. At Pentecost, we remember the our fellow travelers and refuel to continue on through the rolling hills of ordinary time, until we return to where we began at the start of Advent.”
East Orthodox Churches have a somewhat than Western churches, and some of their celebrations/ feast days vary.
If you’d like to learn more about Christmas, the Christian liturgical calendar, and how Christians experience it today, check out this  on the Faith for Normal People podcast.
To all those marking Advent, have a blessed Advent!
