Today, we launched Advent: The Most Wonderful Time of the Year with Susan Goff for individual study and for groups. As I write this post, I am sitting in a coffee shop that is playing Christmas carols a week and a half before Thanksgiving and two weeks before the beginning of Advent. If people bemoan the start of the holiday season inching earlier every year, what about people who try to experience a holy Advent? On the one hand, we prepare for and anticipate the coming of Jesus into our midst at Christmas time. On the other hand, we have already been nudged toward a Christmas activity buzz for two weeks before Advent even begins.

In this class, Bishop Susan Goff of the Diocese of Virginia offers guidance on how to experience a holy Advent in the midst of holiday season frenzy. She offers ways of thinking about the coming of Christ in three tenses. We anticipate the birth of Christ in the past, the coming of Christ into our daily lives in the present, and Christ’s return to us in the future that Christians anticipate when we pray for God’s kingdom to come to us here on Earth. Bishop Goff also offers specific devotional practices to help us anticipate the coming of Christ during the Advent season.

To get a sense of what Bishop Goff offers in this class, please enjoy this preview.