1st Advent – ​​waiting time with a big goal

“How long until Christmas?” asks the girl – she’s maybe five years old – in the supermarket and looks at the chocolate Santas. “We’ll have to wait a while,” replies the mother, “until all the doors on your Advent calendar are open. Then the Christ child comes.

Advent is a waiting period. Because: gifts only come at Christmas. Until then, the children have to practice patience, which is known to be difficult. Not only children, adults also don’t like waiting. Someone once said: In most cases, the waiting time you spend with doctors would be enough to study medicine yourself.

However, there is also a hopeful wait, especially when you have a big goal ahead of you – the birth of a child, for example, or moving into a new house. This waiting time is filled with anticipation of what is to come. Especially since you know that you can never force the really important things in life. It takes time to grow and mature. Being able to wait can help you do the right thing at the right time.

The word “Advent” means “arrival”. The Lord’s Prayer says – in Latin: “Adveniat regnum tuum” – “Thy kingdom come”. Anyone who prays the Lord’s Prayer also asks that the kingdom of God may dawn. Jesus said of himself: Through him, with his arrival in world history, this kingdom of God is within reach. Joy and reconciliation, peace and justice are possible where people get involved with God and count on him.

People long to arrive. To arrive forever at the end of this path that Advent shows with its lights and songs, with Advent wreath and Advent calendar: Arriving in the Kingdom of God. In Jesus of Nazareth, God became human. The afterlife is immersed in this world so that heaven and earth can touch.

And so that we do not lose sight or feeling of our great goal – the coming of God – “Advent” is included in the calendar every year.

I would like to wish you all the joy of Advent today as you light your first candle.

Yours, Rainer Woelki
Archbishop of Cologne