Holidays & Calendar

The four weeks before Christmas, kept as a season of waiting and preparation — for the celebration of Jesus' birth and for His return.

The first day of Lent, marked by a cross of ashes on the forehead as a sign of repentance and mortality — "remember that you are dust."

The evening service on December 24 — the best-attended of the year in many churches — with carols, the Christmas story from Luke 2, and, traditionally, "Silent Night" sung by candlelight at the end.

January 6, the feast marking the arrival of the Magi to worship the infant Jesus — Christ revealed to the nations — and, in the Eastern church, the baptism of Christ. It ends the twelve days of Christmas.

A day on the church calendar honoring a saint or an event in the life of Christ or Mary — marked with special readings, sometimes a Mass or Liturgy, and often, despite the name, no feast.

The week before Easter, walking day by day through Jesus' last days — Palm Sunday (His entry into Jerusalem), Maundy Thursday (the Last Supper), Good Friday (the crucifixion), and Holy Saturday — ending at Easter.

The roughly forty days before Easter, from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday, kept as a season of repentance, fasting, and preparation — often by giving something up.

The Thursday before Easter, remembering the Last Supper — when Jesus washed His disciples' feet, instituted communion, and gave the "new commandment" to love one another. It opens the three holiest days of the year.

The long stretches of the church year that aren't a special season — after Epiphany until Lent, and after Pentecost until Advent — when the Sundays are simply numbered and the liturgical color is green.

The day, fifty days after Easter, when the Holy Spirit came upon the first Christians with wind and fire, and the church began — often called the church's birthday.

A church service on New Year's Eve that prays the old year out and the new year in — with deep roots in the Black church, where it commemorates the night before the Emancipation Proclamation took effect.