Advent, Explained

Vox’s Alissa Wilkinson writes about the season of Advent, which begins four Sundays before Christmas and is often celebrated with countdown calendars. Wilkinson writes, “In addition to being about the anticipation of Jesus’s birth (the first coming), Advent is also set aside as a time of quietness and austerity, meant to keep Christians from glossing over the brokenness of the world and to encourage them to anticipate the Second Coming.” She adds, “Advent calendars (in one form or another) were adapted some time in the 19th century by German Lutherans as a way to mark the days of the season leading up to Christmas.”

Read at Vox

© 2011 Religion & Politics