The Season of Advent and Christmas – #5
In the Advent season, the joy of the coming of Christ will triumph over everything and reign over everything.
Adoration of the Shepherds, paiting by Matthias Stom, 1650 - Image Source
Therefore, in Lent and Advent, we have two Sundays of the year called Sundays of Joy, Gaudete, and Laetare, the only two occasions when the priest can wear a chasuble and a pink stole. This is because pink is softer than purple; it is a slight pause to give the idea that there is a need for penance, but there is a subtle joy.
In Advent, this joy is even greater. It is the joy of the one who was born, the one who died, the one who lives, the one who will reign definitively in his second coming.
Jesus Carries His Cross - Image Source
As we have seen, Advent is also a time of penance. Ideally, during this time of Advent, as we do during Lent, we should also choose a penance to offer to Jesus, who became a Child for our love.
This penance, of course, can be more relaxed than the Lenten penance. The penance of Lent must always be more significant. Advent penance can be a little softer because it has to have this soft character of waiting for Christ to come.
This Advent that we celebrate in the liturgy will happen in everyone's lives as we celebrate this expectation of the coming Christ.
Jesus ascending to heaven, painting by John Singleton Copley - Image Source
When we die, our death is the day that Christ comes. He comes to judge us after our journey. So, Advent is a time of this gentle joy, but it is also a time to think about our lives, believe that we are going to die, and feel that we are waiting for this glorious coming of Christ.
We have yet to determine the day and hour when He will come the second time, although Jesus speaks of some signs in the book of Revelation. Which ones are they?
The conversion of the Jews; the coming of a false prophet who will apparently speak in the name of God, in the name of the Church; and then the coming and reign of the anti-Christ.
These are the signs that Holy Scripture predicts will occur before the second coming of Christ. But this coming of Christ for us individually occurs sooner. We may die before this manifestation of the final judgment in time. So, our death is, in a way, our judgment. We call it a private judgment because everyone who dies meets Christ and already receives the sentence.
Day of Judgment - painting by Michelangelo - Image Source
At the end of history, all those judgments that Jesus made with each person, these judgments, they will be known by everyone, living and dead. We will see the sentence of all who went to Hell and were saved. This will be known. This is universal judgment; it is the end of history.
From then on, no more human beings are born. The number of human beings will have been completed. Then, those who were lost will go to eternal suffering and eternal death. Those who were saved will go to paradise, eternal life, the life that never ends, in the presence of God.
Bibliography; Jesus Cristo, sua Vida, sua Paixão e seu Triunfo by Padre Augustin Berti
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Jesus remains the king of kings and the saviour of the whole world. Compliment of the season