THE O ANTIPHONS ARE ARE AN ANCIENT AND TRADITIONAL ADVENT LITURGY

"The 'O Antiphons,' one of the oldest liturgical rituals in the church, are prayed around the world during the final days of Advent. For the seven days before Christmas, we recall in these prayers a quality of Christ that must be realized before the presence of Christ can consume the world."

The great Advent hymn, O COME, O COME, EMMANUEL is based on the O antiphons.

There is one O antiphon for each day from December 17 to 24. They are all here > http://www.benetvision.org/news_pages/oantiphons.html

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COFFEE BREAK 383

+ Second Sunday of Advent

Great wisdom here > http://teilhard.com/2013/12/07/second-sunday-of-advent-december-8-2013-burning-away-what-divides-us/

Excerpt 1: "The readings can be found here. The beautiful first reading is from Isiah and talks about the vision where the things that divide us are eliminated and all of Creation is brought together in Unity. The Gospel includes a speech from St. John the Baptist that talks about the need for God’s purifying fire to break down our divisions before this Unity can occur."


Excerpt 2: "This week’s reflection comes from Fr. Ron Rolheiser and St. Louis University reflections. I encourage you to read the entire reflection here but set forth below is an ...  excerpt:

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin once suggested that peace and justice will come to us when we reach a high enough psychic temperature so as to burn away the things that still hold us apart. In saying this, he was drawing upon a principle in chemistry: Sometimes two elements will simply lie side by side inside a test-tube and not unite until sufficient heat is applied so as to bring them to a high enough temperature where unity can take place.That’s wonderful metaphor for advent. What is advent?Advent is about getting in touch with our longing. It’s about letting our yearnings raise our psychic temperatures so that we are pushed to eventually let down our guard, hope in new ways, and risk intimacy.