The season of Advent can be a time of hope and joy, as we look forward to Christ’s coming. But it can also be a time of anxiety, grief, fear, and even anger. During tumultuous times especially, these two sides of Advent are connected. Out of our fear, we look to our savior, born into this broken world to bring healing, not just of personal wounds, but of systemic injustice.
This year—amidst tightening immigration policies and assaults on human dignity—our responsibility as Catholics to act in solidarity with our siblings in Christ is all the more pressing. Advent urges people of faith to open our hearts to our neighbors, whether in our immediate communities, or across the world. As LaRyssa Herrington shares in her Advent piece below, Christ came into the world as God incarnate in human form so that we could “go out and become his body in the world.”
U.S. Catholic has selected 9 articles that we hope will inspire you to reflect on the vital centrality of justice in the Advent season.
This Advent, welcome Jesus through radical solidarity
By LaRyssa Herrington
In the Catholic Church, Advent is a time to enter into the heart of the incarnational mystery by caring for the vulnerable and oppressed.
Was Jesus a refugee?
By Alice Camille
Did the Holy Family qualify for refugee status, when they were forced to flee Israel for Egypt to avoid King Herod’s war on baby boys?
Refugees at the border await justice this Advent
By Milton Javier Bravo and Melissa Cedillo
Immigration policies rooted in fear and prejudice create more hardship for those who have already endured much.
3 Advent reflections for LGBTQ+ Catholics
By Jim McDermott
This Advent, imagine God actively celebrating the uniqueness and vision of all God’s children.
Mary, Mary, quite contrary
By Elizabeth Johnson
How can the image of Mary be construed as a source of blessing rather than a blight for women’s lives in both religion and politics?
How liberation theology illuminates Advent in the Bible
A U.S. Catholic interview
Kelley Nikondeha looks the the nativity stories in the Bible and the current situation in Palestine to deepen our understanding of Advent.
Christ has a body—one that needed Pampers
By Father Bryan Massingale
The celebration of Jesus’ birth as a human baby with a human body challenges us to get over our discomfort with incarnation.
A reading from the prophet Bonnie: An Advent essay
By Father Ronald Raab
The spirit of Advent gains new life in a homeless woman’s candid example.
What child is this?
By Megan McKenna
Two thousand years of the reality of the Incarnation of God in human flesh, the coming of the holy into our midst, the poor son of Mary and her husband, Joseph, son of God and son of Man, firstborn of all creation.
Header Image: Unsplash/Laura Nyhuis
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