Christmas Lasts 'til Candlemas!

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Christmastide: The Traditional Christmas Season Begins on Christmas Day & continues until Feb. 2. Forty days which goes back to the Law of Moses. The penitential Advent season (a small Lent) is a preparation for Christmas by penance, sacrifice, & mortification just as Lent is a time of preparation for Easter. In Catholic Traditions, children are told to make many acts of penance & self-abnegation, sacrifices, special devotions, & to have a crib for the Baby Jesus in which to put a piece of straw for each penitential act performed. The idea was to have a comfy bed ready for Baby Jesus by Christmas Day. During Advent, we reflect upon the death of the world. Mortification means ‘to make dead’, it's the struggle against our evil inclinations in order to subject them to the will of God & our will, by it we establish the right order of all our faculties & prepare ourselves for a higher life. The destruction of this world helps strike holy fear into our hearts & reminds that man can’t construct a heaven upon earth, but rather must die to the gluttony, lust, pride & anger so prevalent in this world. The better we observe Advent, the more joyous our Christmas will be.
In the secular world, Christmas carols & decorations spring up as early as Halloween & after Thanksgiving, & those same decorations are thrown out & the carols cease the day after Christmas. Why do some celebrate Christmas before Christmas & forget the penance which our Faith & Tradition tell us we must do? Do Catholics celebrate Easter on Ash Wednesday & forget the Lenten penance? The Liturgy & Discipline of the Church tell us otherwise. We prepare for Christmas, or for Easter, by mortification. Advent is a time to perform acts of fasting & abstinence, & to be counter-cultural by preparing for Christmas. Christmas parties & feasts should be during, & not before Christmas. Christmas Eve (before the Vigil Mass) is a day of fasting & abstinence. The 1983 Code of Canon Law eliminated this fast, but traditional Catholics still keep the fast & abstinence. (Taken from: https://www.fisheaters.com/customschristmas1.html ) This, not Advent, is the true Christmas Season. As most people in secular or Protestantized countries are putting away "Christmas-y" things, & as shopping malls stop blaring "Here Comes Santa Claus," Catholics are just getting started. The cleaning & baking during penitential Advent pays off now, & the feasting & caroling begin!
The entire Christmas Cycle is a crescendo of Christ's manifesting Himself as God and King to the shepherds, to the Magi, at His Baptism, to Simeon & the prophetess, Anna (Luke 2). The days from the Feast of the Nativity to the Epiphany are known as "The Twelve Days of Christmas," with Christmas itself being the first day, & Twelfthnight-5 Jan.-being the last of the twelve days. Christmastide liturgically ends on 13 Jan., the Octave of the Epiphany & the Baptism of Christ (at which time the season of Time After Epiphany begins). But Christmas doesn't end spiritually--i.e., the celebration of the events of Christ's life as a child don't end, & the great Christmas Cycle doesn't end-until Candlemas on 2 Feb. & the beginning of the Season of Septuagesima.
In this way, just as from Ash Wednesday on, we commemorate Christ in the desert for forty days, & just as after Easter we celebrate for forty days until the Ascension, after Christmas we celebrate the Child Jesus for forty days-all through the season of Time After Epiphany-until Candlemas. The schema of those Christ Child celebrations looks like this:
Christmas-Christ is born
Feast of the Holy Innocents- Herod slaughters the baby boys in order to kill the Christ Child
The Circumcision (the Octave of Christmas)-Jesus follows the Law
Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus-After He is circumcised, He is named and becomes a part of the Holy Family
Twelfth Night-The Twelve Days of Christmas as a Feast come to an end
Feast of the Epiphany-Jesus reveals His divinity to the three Magi, & during His Baptism, & at the wedding at Cana
Baptism of Our Lord/Octave of the Epiphany-Christmas liturgically ends with the Octave of the Epiphany
Feast of the Holy Family-Jesus condescends to be subject to His parents
Feast of the Purification (Candlemas)-40 days after giving birth, Mary goes to the Temple to be purified & to "redeem" Jesus per the Old Testament Law of the firstborn. Christmas truly ends as a Season with Candlemas & the beginning of Septuagesima.
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