XIV Advent
The Advent wreath
Four candles, lit one by one, Sunday after Sunday, until Christmas. Light them with the Church — with the Gospel of each Sunday of Advent.
Photo: Jonathunder · CC BY-SA 3.0
Light the candle, read the Gospel together, and pray: Come, Lord Jesus! (Revelation 22:20)
What the wreath means
Light in the long night
Advent is a time of waiting, conversion and hope: it remembers the Lord’s first, humble coming in our flesh, and looks for his glorious coming at the end of time (Directory on Popular Piety, 96).
The wreath of evergreen with four candles has become a sign of Advent in many Christian homes. Lit one more candle each Sunday until Christmas, it recalls the stages of salvation history before Christ’s coming (Directory on Popular Piety, 98). Three candles are violet, the colour of Advent; the third, lit on Gaudete Sunday, is rose — the colour of joy breaking through the waiting (the liturgical colours).
“A symbol of the prophetic light gradually illuminating the long night prior to the rising of the Sun of justice.”
Make a wreath
A ring of evergreen branches with four candles — three violet and one rose. Ask your priest to bless it on the First Sunday of Advent.
Light it on Sunday
Each Sunday light one more candle, read that Sunday’s Gospel together and pray. Light it again on the weekdays whenever you pray together.
From 17 December
The last days before Christmas have the great O Antiphons, one for each evening, calling on the coming Saviour by his ancient names.
The Christmas novena →The meaning of the wreath: the Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy (Congregation for Divine Worship, 2001), nos. 96–98. Sunday Gospels: the Lectionary for Mass, as given by the USCCB daily readings; the one-line summaries are our own.