When God created the world, He placed mankind at the pinnacle of that creation. Yet through our first parents, Adam and Eve, original sin came into the world and was passed down through the human race. War, disease, deprivation, and death itself resulted. Yet Our Lord in His infinite mercy and love raised up good out of evil by exempting His mother from this stain and thus prepared the way for His coming.

The season of Advent is a time of joyful preparation for Our Lord’s Incarnation. The four candles on the Advent Wreath remind us both of our one brief time of preparation, but also of the much longer period chronicled in the Old Testament. Yet as we learn from that time in history, preparing for the Savior’s coming is not tantamount to receiving Him.

The time of Advent is a time of paradox. The purple veil on the tabernacle, the use of the penitential Psalms at Lauds, and other liturgical rubrics point to this season as being one of penance. Yet on Sundays and other feast days, a festive spirit takes precedence. How we should understand this seeming contradiction is the subject of this sermon.

The season of Advent is not just the start of the liturgical year. It is a time of preparation for the Incarnation of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Each Christmas brings with it a special grace. It is a time for us to be transformed if we are properly disposed toward accepting the miracle, to paraphrase St. Athanasius, of God becoming man so that we may become like Him.

Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre’s 1974 Declaration of was nothing less than an affirmation of the Catholic Faith. It has guided the work of the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) for five decades and confirms above all that the SSPX is an apostolate of the Catholic Church that exists for her benefit and the good of all souls entrusted to her.

The season of Advent is a time to reflect on the many graces God gives us. One of these is the gift of the Miraculous Medal, also known as the Medal of Our Lady of Graces, which Our Blessed Mother revealed first to St. Catherine Labouré and is now a devotion embraced by millions of Catholics all over the world.

On the last Sunday after Pentecost, the Church reminds us of the end of all things, including our lives and the world itself. And when Christ says, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass.” And what are these words except those words of love that Christ spoke throughout His earthly life. And it is those words of love that hold forth the promise that after everything ends, there will be a new world and a new life in Christ.

The final Sunday of the liturgical cycle provides an opportunity to step back and reflect. For what is the liturgical year? It is God giving Himself to us in a multitude of ways. Each week–each feast–contains a special grace for the faithful. And so in reflecting on the liturgical year, our souls should be filled with gratitude and for that we give thanks.

In St. Paul’s epistle to the Philippians, he reminds the faithful that Our Lord is God while describing what holiness is. Moreover, while St. Paul details all the ways he followed the Law faithfully, he does not place his hope there. Rather, his hope is the same as ours ought to be: to acknowledge that Jesus Christ is God and that we may be united to Him in His passion and death.

Our Lord’s choice to teach through parables presents challenges for us as now as they did for those in His own day. This is not, as St. John Chrysostom instructs us, because Christ wanted to conceal His teachings. Rather, He invites our wonder through these parables to place us on the road to true conversion and understanding.