Advent: A time of fasting, preparation for Christmas

Advent: A time of fasting, preparation for Christmas

(Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)


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SALT LAKE CITY — Christians around the world have found various ways to prepare their hearts and minds to receive Christ during the holiday season.

“You’re anticipating that finally the Messiah will come and shatter the darkness of our dreary world and bring us light and redeem and save us," said Copeland Johnston, adviser to the religious studies program at the University of Utah. “It’s coming. It’s coming. He’s coming. He’s coming.”

Depending on the tradition, observance can range from lighting candles and following a specific liturgy in a spirit of eager anticipation, to fasting and centering their lives around charitable acts.

In Catholic and Episcopal religions, Advent begins with evening prayers, or First Vespers, the Sunday closest to or on Nov. 30 and runs until First Vespers on Christmas Day. It is observed by many Christians, including Catholics, Episcopalians, Orthodox Christians, Lutherans, Presbyterians and adherents of other Protestant denominations.

“You get a very different kind of pace to the season. It’s much slower,” said Norm Jones, history professor at Utah State University. "It certainly tamps (commercialism) down in the liturgical sense. It doesn't do anything for the kids."

Members of First Presbyterian Church in Salt Lake City greened their sanctuary and church Sunday, stringing evergreen garland on banisters, placing wreaths in the sanctuary and setting up Christmas trees in anticipation for Advent.

“It’s meant to be a living tradition. It’s not something that, ‘Oh, we do it because you have to do it,'" said the Rev. Mike Imperiale, senior pastor of First Presbyterian. "You really want people to … enhance their own personal relationship with God and Christ by reading about these things and hearing about them again and sharing them with each other and going out into the world, too.”

Advent is part of the liturgical calendar that takes observers through the seasons of the church.

“It’s really part of the historic, longtime rhythm of a church year,” Imperiale said.

In its early days, it was a season of fasting to help people prepare to receive Christ, according to Catholic News Agency. While it remains a season of fasting for some, it has evolved over time.

Symbolism

Advent in Latin is usually translated to mean "coming." Many faiths use advent wreaths made of evergreens as symbols of eternity and life. Some celebrate Advent in their congregations and others in their homes.

Observers of the tradition light a new candle each week leading up to Christmas. Depending upon the denomination, some will celebrate Sunday, and others midweek.

First Presbyterian Church members Dax and Jamie Mascarenas, Christine Gibbs and Pamela Atkinson "green" the church with a giving tree in Salt Lake City Sunday, Nov. 23, 2014. Christians are ready to mark Advent â€" the period beginning four Sundays before Christmas and observed by some Christians as a season of prayer and fasting. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)
First Presbyterian Church members Dax and Jamie Mascarenas, Christine Gibbs and Pamela Atkinson "green" the church with a giving tree in Salt Lake City Sunday, Nov. 23, 2014. Christians are ready to mark Advent â€" the period beginning four Sundays before Christmas and observed by some Christians as a season of prayer and fasting. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News)

According to the Rev. Imperiale, the first two candles lit are purple and represent hope and love, respectively; the third is pink or rose and represents peace; and the fourth is purple and represents joy. The final candle sits in the center of the wreath, is white, and called the Christ candle. Depending on the faith tradition, it may be lit either on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.

In Catholicism, the purple candles symbolize prayer, penance and sacrifices made to prepare for performing good works and for Christmas, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"The progressive lighting of the candles symbolizes the expectation and hope surrounding our Lord's first coming into the world and the anticipation of his Second Coming to judge the living and the dead," the conference's website reads.

The candles also represent the light of Christ and allude to a time when the days become longer, ushering in more light.

Some celebrate with a smaller evergreen tree, or Jesse tree, to symbolize Jesus being a descendent, or root or branch, of Jesse, Johnston said. Another tradition during advent is to have a creche, or Nativity, with the baby Jesus missing until Christmas.

Those celebrating Advent are anticipating two types of Messianic arrivals: Jesus' birth and his Second Coming.

"You're anticipating that finally the Messiah will come and shatter the darkness of our dreary world and bring us light and redeem and save us," Johnston said. "Jesus is the one that gives us eternal life, and that’s something we can’t give ourselves, and so it plays both stories.”

Advent also looks to another arrival of the Messiah, the Rev. Imperiale said: that of the "present, by faith, in our lives now."

Variations

Members of the Latino congregation at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church, known as Iglesia Episcopal de San Esteban, observe Advent by lighting candles each week but find more significant meaning in their Las Posadas celebration.

“The posada in so many ways represents the pilgrimage of many of the immigrants, not only coming to this country but being in the country. Knocking doors and being (told), ‘No, there is no place for you,’ and … going to the next door and finally each situation or person (would) open their home to welcome people,” said the Rev. Canon Pablo Ramos of Iglesia Episcopal de San Esteban.

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At St. Stephen's, members of the congregation meet at the church and visit different stations while singing songs. At the final station, half of the people will stand at the entrance of the sanctuary representing innkeepers, and half will stand outside as pilgrims. They end with a song that has a final welcoming verse.

All will enter the sanctuary and say a prayer, and Ramos will deliver a meditation on their roles as pilgrims.

This celebration traditionally runs for nine days in Mexican and Guatemalan neighborhoods, but it is not practical for those in the United States to come together for multiple days, Ramos said.

For many in the congregation, the posada allows them as immigrants to "relate with the Holy Family," gives a "message of hope … because someone is going to open the door for us," and provides "a safe place for (parishioners) to develop a relationship with God," the Rev. Ramos said.

Orthodox Christians

Beginning Nov. 15, many Orthodox Christians started a 40-day fast, abstaining from meat and limiting their consumption of dairy and fish when possible. Each member is expected to work out the specifics of their fast with their priest.

"In order for Orthodox Christians to enter into the depths of this holy mystery of God, proper preparation is essential," said the Rev. Matthew Gilbert, senior priest of the Greek Orthodox Church of Greater Salt Lake.

The period is a joyful fast to help Orthodox Christians reawaken their connection with Christ.

"If adhered to both in letter and spirit, the faithful are afforded a true appreciation for the 'reason for the season,'" he said.

By controlling what is consumed, people can also better control what they exude in terms of what they say about others, how they say it ,and how charitable they are, the Rev. Gilbert said.


In order for Orthodox Christians to enter into the depths of this holy mystery of God, proper preparation is essential.

–Rev. Matthew Gilbert, senior priest of the Greek Orthodox Church of Greater Salt Lake


"The fast is not a mere legalistic religious formula but, equally, abstinence from certain kinds of behavior — self-indulgent behavior, which deprives us of the gift of recognizing and reaching out to help those in need," he said.

The Rev. Gilbert compared the period leading up to Christmas, or the Nativity, as “a focusing.” While many think of placing lights, buying presents and decorating, the Orthodox are in a season of "preparing for the birth of the newborn Savior,” he said.

Fasting in this tradition is expected to go along with a focus on charity.

"For those Orthodox Christians who embrace the gift of this Lenten Fast, Christmas will undoubtedly be experienced in a new and profound way," the Rev. Gilbert said. "The artificiality of Christmas' contemporary commercialism will be replaced with the genuineness of a timeless truth — that Christ came into the world out of his love for all mankind. This illumination will enable us to look at others differently and see Christ's face in all people everywhere."

To help those in need, the Greek Orthodox Church of Greater Salt Lake will have an Angel Tree and wreath to help needy families in and around the community, the Rev. Gilbert said.

The Greek Orthodox faithful are among those who begin celebrating Christmas on Dec. 25 and continue for 12 days leading up to Epiphany on Jan. 6. Greek Orthodox believe Epiphany represents the day Jesus was baptized.

Other Orthodox Christians and those who follow a more traditional Christian calendar observe Nativity on Dec. 25 and Epiphany on Jan. 6, 7 or 8. The Epiphany marks either Jesus' baptism or the Three Wise Men's visit to the baby Jesus, depending on the beliefs of the faith tradition.

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