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A Catholic Christmas feature with a 2008 Advent calendar updated daily from Advent through Christmas to Epiphany.

Seasonal Features
Advent/Christmas

Franciscan Communications: YouTube for Advent
2008 Advent Catholic Treasures with Father Greg Friedman, O.F.M.
“Why is Christmas on Dec. 25?”
“Where did the custom of the Christmas tree come from?”
“What is the religious symbolism behind the Advent wreath?
“Advent key figure #1: the Blessed Virgin Mary”
“Advent key figure #2: St. John the Baptist”
“Caught in Christmas nostalgia?”

Advent Radio Retreat
Franciscan Radio encourages you to put aside today’s cares and worries, and make a “radio retreat”—online. Using the Windows Media Player, Real Player or any MP3 player, including Apple’s iPod, take this opportunity to focus clearly on what God is saying to you this Advent.

Kicking the Worry Habit
As we prepare our spirits for the season of Advent, the first item of clutter is the worry habit, says Susan Rowland, author of Make Room for God: Clearing Out the Clutter. She offers antidotes to help us get our house in order to welcome the coming of God our lives.

What Are We Waiting For?
The celebration of Christmas is not a sentimental waiting for a baby to be born, but much more an asking for history to be born, according to Franciscan Father Richard Rohr, author of Preparing for Christmas With Richard Rohr: Daily Meditations for Advent. Catholics, he says, do the gospels no favor when making Jesus, the eternal Christ, into a perpetual baby, a baby able to ask for little or no adult response.

The True Gift of Christmas
From St. Anthony Messenger magazine
A little boy in an airport rekindles a priest’s love for the holiday season.

Sunday Soundbite
First Sunday of Advent—Be Vigilant
Second Sunday of Advent—The Power of Prayer
Third Sunday of Advent—Joyful Expectation
Fourth Sunday of Advent—The Old and the New
Christmas—God's Extravagance
Feast of the Holy Family—The Rest of the Story
Mary, Mother of God—The Model Disciple
Epiphany—The Message of Faith
Baptism of the Lord—A Good Beginning

Quicklinks
Advent FAQs: What Is Advent? Who Established Advent?
Incarnation of Jesus (United States Catholic Catechism for Adults)
How Christians Should Celebrate Advent and Christmas
Advent Customs: How to Make an Advent Wreath and a Jesse Tree
Catholic Saints of Advent: Mary, St. Francis Xavier, St. Nicholas
More Advent Inspiration From Previous Years



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Rose Philippine Duchesne: Born in Grenoble, France, of a family that was among the new rich, Philippine learned political skills from her father and a love of the poor from her mother. The dominant feature of her temperament was a strong and dauntless will, which became the material—and the battlefield—of her holiness. She entered the convent at 19 and remained despite their opposition. As the French Revolution broke, the convent was closed, and she began taking care of the poor and sick, opened a school for street urchins and risked her life helping priests in the underground. <p>When the situation cooled, she personally rented her old convent, now a shambles, and tried to revive its religious life. The spirit was gone, and soon there were only four nuns left. They joined the infant Society of the Sacred Heart, whose young superior, St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, would be her lifelong friend. In a short time Philippine was a superior and supervisor of the novitiate and a school. But her ambition, since hearing tales of missionary work in Louisiana as a little girl, was to go to America and work among the Indians. At 49, she thought this would be her work. With four nuns, she spent 11 weeks at sea en route to New Orleans, and seven weeks more on the Mississippi to St. Louis. She then met one of the many disappointments of her life. The bishop had no place for them to live and work among Native Americans. Instead, he sent her to what she sadly called "the remotest village in the U.S.," St. Charles, Missouri. With characteristic drive and courage, she founded the first free school for girls west of the Mississippi. </p><p>It was a mistake. Though she was as hardy as any of the pioneer women in the wagons rolling west, cold and hunger drove them out—to Florissant, Missouri, where she founded the first Catholic Indian school, adding others in the territory. "In her first decade in America, Mother Duchesne suffered practically every hardship the frontier had to offer, except the threat of Indian massacre—poor lodging, shortages of food, drinking water, fuel and money, forest fires and blazing chimneys, the vagaries of the Missouri climate, cramped living quarters and the privation of all privacy, and the crude manners of children reared in rough surroundings and with only the slightest training in courtesy" (Louise Callan, R.S.C.J., <i>Philippine Duchesne</i>). </p><p>Finally, at 72, in poor health and retired, she got her lifelong wish. A mission was founded at Sugar Creek, Kansas, among the Potawatomi. She was taken along. Though she could not learn their language, they soon named her "Woman-Who-Prays-Always." While others taught, she prayed. Legend has it that Native American children sneaked behind her as she knelt and sprinkled bits of paper on her habit, and came back hours later to find them undisturbed. She died in 1852 at the age of 83.</p> What should I do about my son’s Jewish wedding? O Wisdom of our God Most High, guiding creation with power and love: Come to teach us the path of knowledge!

 
PICK OF THE DAY
DVD! The World of St. Francis
The World of St. Francis: Past, Present and Future includes three programs on the life, times and influence of St. Francis.

 
CATHOLIC GREETINGS
Thanksgiving
In America, Thanksgiving is one of the rare times when religion and civics intersect. Let us always give thanks and praise ...



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