The Church's year begins on the first Sunday of Advent, a season consisting of four Sundays. It has now lost its former spurious character of being penitential, but it is still a period of preparation. We look forward to the celebration of Christ's first coming and think also about Christ's second coming at the end of time. 'It is thus a season of joyful and spiritual expectation' - 'tempus devotae ac iucundae exspectationis' ('Normae universales de anno liturgico et de calendario', in Calendarium Romanum, (Civitas Vaticana): Typis polyglottis Vaticanis, 1969, n. 39). The weekdays from 17-24 December are more directly oriented to preparation for the Nativity, and the second Advent preface is said.
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