The Catholic Church is known for her love of organization. Everything has its proper place, season, and time. For example, canon law is rigidly organized so that even untrained undergraduates can navigate the canons with a fair amount of ease. The Mass according to any pre-1962 Tridentine Missal is extremely organized: every little detail is meticulously planned out in rubrical books so that the priest can focus on the most important moment in the Mass — the Consecration — with rapt attention, having no need to worry about the minutiae. Holy Mother Church also provides us with an easy-to-follow calendar: there are seasons in which we are called to specially remember our sins, and thus to repent, and they are immediately followed by seasons in which we are explicitly called to rejoice. The observant reader will note that “seasons” is plural, and that is because there are indeed two seasons to be discussed here. Around this time of year, it is quite common for Catholics to begin their Lenten planning, as we are exhorted by the Church to commit ourselves wholly to this season of penance. Indeed, in 2026, this season of repentance has already begun, and as such, perhaps we are instead looking ahead in this moment to the joys of the Easter season that already fast approaches. However, Lent is not the only season of penance and prayer that prefigures a time of great rejoicing. The pre-Christmas season of Advent does much the same for us as we prepare for the natal coming of the Lord, and yet its penitential and prayerful nature is often overlooked or underrespected. Both of these seasons are times in which “we journey together toward the Kingdom of God” — and toward a greater appreciation of Christ and His role in our salvation — with our Christian brothers and sisters;1 and yet, Advent and its preparatory role is so often minimized. So how do these seasons tie together, and how can recognizing the importance of the shared purpose of Advent and Lent prepare us for a more fruitful Lenten season this year?
On the outset, Advent and Lent share a lot of unique-to-them structural similarities fitting of their twinned status as the Church’s seasons of penitence. For example, the sacred ministers wear violet vestments, except for at certain legally permitted votive Masses, such as Advent’s Missa Rorate Caeli, and on solemnities — such as the Solemnities of Saint Joseph and the Annunciation of Our Lord in Lent and the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Advent — at which they wear white, and on the Sundays properly known as Gaudete and Laetare Sundays, respectively, on which they wear rose in a fleeting moment of anticipatory joy amidst the sobriety of the seasons. Violet is one of the Church’s two colors of mourning, alongside the traditional black, and the colors of the vestments are meant to be reminiscent of the idea that we are to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord with our somberness during these sacred seasons.2 It is in truly preparing our hearts and minds for the coming of the Lord, whether at His Birth or at His Resurrection, that we are able to recall that these seasons “[come] providentially to awaken us, to rouse us [from our lethargy],” and that their primary purpose is to help us to “begin our journey of conversion” that will allow us to fully embrace the joyful seasons which come after.3 The violet vestments, which are worn every day during these seasons due to a suppression of feasts that take place within the seasons of Advent and Lent (with the exception of the aforementioned solemnities), serve as a striking visual reminder of this idea that a somber reawakening of our souls is required to be able to completely celebrate the joyful seasons of Christmas and Easter with the true metanoia, that is, conversion of the heart, that we are invited by the mysteries of Our Lord to experience.
Another important similarity between these two seasons actually centers around a few things that are removed from the Mass. With the exception of solemnities, the Gloria in excelsis Deo (Glory to God in the highest) is not sung or recited inside of the Mass. The liturgy moves straight from the Kyrie eleison into the Collect with intentional effect. The joyful strains of glory meant to be given to God that echo the angels’ song on Christmas morning4 are conspicuously absent from the Mass.5 This is in keeping with the idea that the seasons are meant to refrain from being overly jubilant in nature, as they are instead more restrained heralds of the seasons of full jubilence. It makes sense, then, that this “venerable hymn in which the Church, gathered together in the Holy Spirit, glorifies and entreats God the Father and the Lamb”6 should be “put away,” so to speak, for the season. In similar manner, the General Instructions of the Roman Missal mandate that the organ be entirely silent save lightly accompanying singing during Lent, and that its use be greatly reduced during Advent.7 This same instruction also applies to other instruments that are lawfully permitted by Sacrosanctum Concilium for sacred music,8 thus signaling that the music during these penitential seasons should be culled back in order to avoid “expressing in anticipation the full joy” of either Easter or Christmas.9 For the same reason that the Gloria is suppressed in these preparatory seasons, so, too, do we suppress the superfluous extra elements of sacred music, emphasizing the simplicity of the state of preparation that our souls should be in. In this state of simplicity, we can see what really matters, and once we have come to embrace that, we can welcome all of the joyous “extras” back. Traditionally, the first use of the Gloria and full organ after the penitential seasons is an event of extravagant fanfare — having been separated from them for weeks, it is a joyous occasion to welcome them back to the Mass. Likewise, it is a great joy for our souls to ring in the seasons of rejoicing with a newfound stillness rooted in simplicity. The book of Ecclesiastes reminds us that “for everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven,”10 a most appropriate reminder that sometimes, what is missing from the liturgy actually speaks more powerfully in its absence than adding new things to the Mass does.
Tradition further holds that Advent and Lent are built on three common pillars: fasting, almsgiving, and prayer. Fasting, which the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has solemnly defined for American Catholics as one normal meal plus two smaller meals that do not together equal the contents of the normal meal,11 which is practiced on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, plus abstinence from meat on Fridays,12 is arguably the most well-known of the pillars. Most Catholics are familiar with the fasting and abstinence requirements, and almost all are familiar with the idea of giving something up for Lent. However, such practices are not limited to Lent. While it is less common to give something up for Advent or to practice abstinence from meat on Fridays within it, it is pious tradition that both practices are kept up, as Advent is just as much of a penitential season as Lent is. In denying ourselves certain goods until the seasons of joy begin, we make a clear distinction between the times of repentance and the times of rejoicing. By doing this, we allow our souls to be formed: in the absence of the temporal goods that we give up, virtuous practices can grow in their place. When we welcome the temporal goods back during Christmas and Easter, they coexist with the virtues that we nurtured in their absence during Advent and Lent. This allows for a more well-rounded and pleasing experience for us. Learning to allow the temporal to coexist with the spiritual is a difficult task, but one that is possible with practice. How appropriate, then, that the Church’s calendar has two built-in periods of practice!
The second traditional pillar of the penitential seasons is almsgiving. The USCCB says that “almsgiving is ‘a witness to fraternal charity’ and ‘a work of justice pleasing to God.’”13 And indeed, almsgiving is meant to remind us of the righteous importance of sharing what we have with those that are less fortunate than us. “Almsgiving saves from death and purges away every sin,”14 and thus, it rightfully takes its place within the three most important practices during the penitential seasons. Almsgiving is a manifestation of the Christian charity that we are all called to live as followers of Jesus Christ. To that end, many dioceses within the US carry out special second collections during Masses in Lent for a variety of different charities that help out those that are less fortunate than us. A similar tradition in Advent, albeit at the parochial level, is the Jesse Tree, or Giving Tree, which is a way for parishioners to buy Christmas presents for local families that may not be able to afford them, as well as the existence of a collection for the local Catholic Charities, which is traditionally taken up on Christmas Eve. While almsgiving is usually understood to be connected with a donation of money, this is not the end-all, be-all of what it can be. Rather, donations of time, other resources, and even prayer all count as almsgiving. Even if one is unable to practice the traditional form of almsgiving, especially during Advent, when it heavily hinges on the ability to buy items, it is wholly appropriate to practice an alternative form of almsgiving in order to fulfill our call to charity. As Pope Francis reminds us, “almsgiving [can be] expressed in many ways”;15 it is not restricted to one manner. Regardless, “almsgiving is a gesture of love,”16 and thus a most appropriate action for the seasons in which we learn how to love better as we await with hope the coming of the Lord, who loves us more than we can ever know.
The final common pillar of the seasons of Advent and Lent is prayer. It may seem superfluous to say that prayer is an important part of the seasons of penance, because prayer should be a part of our lives regardless of what season we are in. However, it is in these seasons that we are especially called to “let prayer become an essential part of each of our lives” so that we can build good and long-lasting habits.17 What better time is there to allow such habits to flourish than when we have sacrificed something else? The idea of allowing virtuous practices to flourish in the newly empty space within our souls that was mentioned earlier comes into play here. Monsignor Farmer rightly points out that we tend to only go to God in prayer when we need something — how many of us return to Him in thanksgiving time and time again whenever He does anything for us? Even if we do, we certainly don’t do it enough; we are no better than the nine lepers in the Gospel of Luke that are healed but do not return to thank the Lord.18 Through prayer, we can come to a more intimate communion with God, a closer relationship with Him. Such a relationship is not easy, however. Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen is apocryphally quoted as having once said, “Prayer is a relationship, and relationships require an awful lot of work.” And indeed, he is correct. But what better time to start working on such a difficult relationship than when our souls are already meant to be in a state of openness, receptivity, and sacrifice? This is why prayer is the third pillar of the penitential seasons. Without it, the other two are useless for the same reason that it would be a useless gesture to give your girlfriend flowers when you hate her: without a solid relationship between the two agents, any action that proceeds from such a relationship is fruitless. Thus, in both Advent and Lent, Holy Mother Church recommends that we work on our prayer lives more than we do outside of them, in addition to fasting and almsgiving alongside our fellow Christians.
For all of their similarities, however, there are some differences between Advent and Lent that bear some exposition here. First, the word “Alleluia” is not used during Lent. In fact, historically, there is a tradition of churches quite literally burying the word until Easter in a symbolic act of enforcing this liturgical norm. Something else that is unique to Lent is its length. While the preparatory season for Christmas is only four weeks long, the preparatory season for Easter is six-and-a-half weeks long (in fact, in the pre-1962 Missals, there are three extra weeks — beginning with Septuagesima, Sexegesima, and Quinquagesima Sundays — in which a sort-of “mini-Lent” serves as a transition between Epiphany and Lent). Yet a final difference between the two penitential seasons is their relative severity. In Advent, just about everyone can agree that violet is the primary liturgical color, with rose being allowed on Gaudete Sunday, for example. However, during Lent in the Ambrosian Rite (a particular rite of the Roman Catholic Church in northern Italy), black is the liturgical color of choice.19 Black is the liturgical color that represents the most severe form of repentance. In the new Mass, it is only allowed to be used on All Souls’ Day and during funerals. However, in keeping with the unspoken tradition that Lent is to be celebrated as a stricter season of penance than Advent, the Ambrosians use black vestments during Lent. There are, then, some fairly minor differences between Advent and Lent, but they are not so major as to damage their joint status as seasons of repentance.
Just as Pope Benedict XVI speaks of a mutual enrichment between the Ordinary and Extraordinary forms of the Mass in his motu proprio Summorum Pontificum, so, too, do Advent and Lent mutually enrich each other in their practices.20 The primarily Lenten practice of fasting and the primarily Advent practice of almsgiving can easily be superimposed onto each other, inviting us to further both during both seasons, as well as inviting us to use them to further our prayer lives. In fully exercising the three pillars that these two seasons are built on, and in recognizing the importance of the structural similarities among them, as well, we can truly allow our souls to flourish in the state of preparation that Advent and Lent engender in us. By embracing what is unique about these seasons, we can come to even more greatly appreciate when everything becomes “normal” again come the seasons of joy. And in embracing the out-of-ordinary, we allow our hearts and souls to latch onto the absolutely extraordinary in our relationship with God. Let us not be afraid to “prepare the way for the coming of the Lord,” as the well-known Advent hymn exhorts us; instead, let us welcome Him with open hearts and open minds, willing to do what is necessary to embrace the spirit of the penitential seasons and the change that they are meant to bring about within us. Laudetur Iesus Christus, in saecula saeculorum!
- Pope Leo XIV. Angelus message, given December 7, 2025. ↩︎
- cf. Matthew 3:2 (NRSV2CE). ↩︎
- Pope Francis. Ash Wednesday Homily, given March 5, 2014. ↩︎
- cf. Luke 2:14. ↩︎
- cf. General Instructions of the Roman Missal (GIRM), no. 53. ↩︎
- ibid. ↩︎
- ibid., 313. ↩︎
- cf. Second Vatican Council. Sacrosanctum Concilium, 120. ↩︎
- GIRM 313. ↩︎
- Ecclesiastes 3:1. ↩︎
- Particular law of the Catholic Church in the United States in accordance with Canon 1253. ↩︎
- The requirement that American Catholics abstain from meat on every Friday of the year was abrogated by the proper ecclesial authorities in their Pastoral Statement on Penance and Abstinence of 1966; cf. Canon 1251. ↩︎
- cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), no. 2462. ↩︎
- Tobit 12:9. ↩︎
- Pope Francis. Jubilee Audience, April 9, 2016. ↩︎
- ibid. ↩︎
- Monsignor James P. Farmer. Power of prayer during Lent, January 19, 2012. Catholic Review (https://www.archbalt.org/power-of-prayer-during-lent/). ↩︎
- cf. Luke 17:18. ↩︎
- cf. Nicola de Grandi. Liturgical Colors for Lent in the Ambrosian Tradition, March 23, 2010. New Liturgical Movement (https://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2010/03/liturgical-colours-for-lent-in.html) ↩︎
- cf. Benedict XVI. Summorum Pontificum, July 7, 2007. ↩︎
