4 Ways to Make the Most Out of Advent

How do we make Advent count? How do we make it a true season of preparation? These four steps will help elevate your Advent experience:

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1. Plan Your Preparation – The Advent Season

If you’re really going to prepare for Christmas, then you need to prepare to prepare for Christmas. For that reason, please sit down, and write down a plan. Like Lent, Advent is a time of prayer and fasting. It precedes a major Church Feast: Christmas.

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Just like Lent, you should take some time to plan your preparation (prayer, fasting, almsgiving) for the coming celebration (Christmas). What steps are you taking this Advent to prepare your heart for the coming of the Lord?

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2. Plan Your Celebration – The Christmas Octave?

In the midst of your preparation, don’t forget to plan your celebration. That is, the celebration of Christmas! Here are some helpful tips to prepare for the big day:

• Sing Christmas carols to Jesus in the manger after Christmas Mass.
• Sing Christmas carols every day of the Octave of Christmas since you haven't listened to them for the four weeks of Advent.
• Attend a few (or all) of the Masses following Christmas Day. There are some good feasts - St. Stephen, St. John, Holy Innocents, Holy Family!
• Each day of the Octave, meditate on a different part of the Nativity. Think of Joseph and Mary welcoming their son, the shepherds arriving, and the angels glorifying God.

3. Choose One Additional Devotion (even if small)

If we’re actually going to prepare for the visible entrance of the Eternal Word into human existence, then our lives during Advent can’t just be same ol’ same ol’. Luckily for us, the Church doesn’t make us do Lent twice, so during Advent we get to do joyful preparation, rather than strict and penitential preparation.

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Obviously, you can still be penitential during Advent, but it’s not emphasized as much. The goal in this step is to do something that both reminds you of the coming joy and?simultaneously brings joy. Here are some examples:

• Pray the St. Andrew Christmas Novena prayer daily. It’s simply beautiful. You can find it here.
• Do one (or all if you’re up for it) of the Liturgy of the Hours (e.g. Morning Prayer, Midday Prayer, Evening Prayer, Night Prayer, etc.). Advent brings special antiphons that you won’t read the rest of the year!
• Read the O Antiphons during the 8 days leading up to Christmas – also quite beautiful and can give you a nice pep-up right before the big day.
• Pray a daily rosary with your family or roommates. Place yourself in Mary’s shoes as she prepared for Christmas!

4. Slow Down and Soak it In!?

Finally, just enjoy the season.

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Some of our favorite Advent memories were having quiet weeknights sitting by a fire and a lit Christmas tree. Or walking through parks and driving through neighborhoods to see lights and decorations.

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There may be some stressful things we can’t get out of, but we can schedule ahead of time and pick those days and nights where we’ll let the peace of the season sink in and prepare our hearts to receive Him.

Further Resources

Video - Advent Conversation with Curtis Martin and Jonathan Roumie from The Chosen Join the discussion with Curtis Martin, CEO of FOCUS, and Jonathan Roumie, actor in The Chosen as they prepare for Advent.

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Article -?10 Advent Songs to Remind You It’s Not Yet Christmas | Matt Fradd I’ve been looking for some beautiful Advent songs to play. It’s harder than I expected. Here are ten which I found particularly beautiful.?

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Article - This Advent: Offer Your Heart to the Thief of Hearts We’re not just waiting; we’re preparing. We receive the Body of Christ in the Eucharist and so we hunger for Him ever more. We honor the Chief Shepherd even as we care for His flock around us. We want Him to come. Lord, we offer You our hearts and our lives today!

Advent is, so to speak, an intense training that directs us decisively toward him who already came, who will come, and who comes continuously.

- Pope St. John Paul II