For most of us, the beginning of Advent brings on all sorts of memories and excitement – mostly directed at the celebration of Christmas. Even for the most staunched “delayers,” Advent has the overwhelming connotation of Christmas. Yet, no matter if your lights are already up and the secular Christmas music is blaring or if you’re delaying all that until as close to Christmas as possible, it is helpful to step back and realize that the first part of Advent actually directs our attention to preparation not for the first, but the Second Coming of Christ. We see this explicitly in the prayers for the Mass of the First Sunday of Advent. In the collect, we pray, “Grant your faithful, we pray, almighty God, the resolve to run forth to meet your Christ with righteous deeds at His coming, so that, gathered at His right hand, they may be worthy to possess the heavenly Kingdom.” The resolve to run forth that we pray for here is not to the manger but to the King of Glory who will come again to judge the world. The prayer after communion reinforces this: “May these mysteries, O Lord, in which we have participated, profit us, we pray; for even now, as we walk amid passing things, you teach us by them to love the things of heaven and hold fast to what endures.” This theme, however, is made most apparent in the preface for the Masses of Advent. The rubrics indicate that the first preface is to be prayed until Monday, December 16, then the Church switches to the second preface of Advent. This delineates the switch in the major theme of the season from preparation for Christ’s Second Coming to the preparation for the great solemnity of the Nativity. The central part of the preface for this first part of Advent prays, “For He assumed at His first coming the lowliness of human flesh, and so fulfilled the design You formed long ago, and opened for us the way to eternal salvation, that, when He comes again in glory and majesty and all is at last made manifest, we who watch for that day may inherit the great promise in which now we dare to hope.” Given these prayers and their clear themes of preparation for the coming of Christ again, it is helpful to reflect on the connection between all of the themes of the end times that the Church has been putting before us in the closing of the liturgical year up to the solemnity of Christ the King and the coming of Christ at Christmas. The Son of God was sent into the world with a mission: to do the will of the Father. This mission is ultimately to reconcile the world back to God. Thus, in His coming as a man, He begins His mission, but the totality of His task is not accomplished until everything is made new through His Paschal Mystery (His passion, death, and resurrection). Therefore, as Catholics, it is essential for us to recognize that Christmas is not an end in itself. The fact that God takes on a human nature – as amazing as that is – is not the only thing we are preparing to celebrate at Christmas. It is impossible to parcel out the mystery of what God is doing in this world and to merely commemorate the birth of the Savior. Liturgical memory actually communicates the reality of the Resurrected Christ to us. We cannot compartmentalize God. Thus, as we enter into this time of preparation, we do well to keep before our eyes the mystery in front of us: God has already come into the world, and we can celebrate the glory of that truth. But we cannot forget that His coming in the flesh is fulfilled in our being united to Him (through, above all, the sacraments) in the communion of the Church. And this unity leads us to the longing for that which has not yet happened: the final coming of Christ to judge the world and to definitively reign as the King of Peace, when death itself will be conquered and the world made new. Therefore, the only real distraction from the spirit of the season of Advent is the one that draws us away from the hopeful anticipation (and preparation) of the Second Coming of Christ in glory. Let us watch for that day. And, as the final prayer of this Sunday’s Mass begs of God: May we walk amid passing things of this world holding fast to what endures. Or, put another way, a successful Advent is one which deepens our living of the truth that – to draw on C.S. Lewis – all that is not eternal is eternally out of date. Father Mark Hellinger is parochial vicar at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Fort Wayne. The post Prepare for the Second Coming of Christ appeared first on Today's Catholic.