First Sunday of Advent

Today is the first Sunday of Advent. We are in preparation for the Coming of Christ at Christmas, but we remember that we are also in spiritual preparation for the Second Coming of Christ at the end of time.

Were it not the first Sunday of Advent, today would be the Feast of St. Andrew. Today we begin the St. Andrew Novena, saying this prayer fifteen times a day until Christmas:

Hail and blessed be the hour and the moment in which the Son of God was born of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in piercing cold. In that hour, vouchsafe, O my God, to hear my prayers and grant my desires through the merits of our Savior, Jesus Christ, and of his Blessed Mother. Amen.