November 29, 2025
Letter from the Editor //
Dear Sister,
“Stay awake!” Jesus tells us on this First Sunday or Advent, “For you do not know on which day your Lord will come” (Matthew 24:42). The first part of Advent is a time of waiting for the Lord to come at the end of time. We keep our focus on Christ as our King, ruling all things, and coming again soon. The world will pressure us to jump right into the festivities of Christmas, but the Church asks us to hold back from the joys to come. When we follow the secular culture without preparing our hearts for the Lord’s coming, we are like people asleep. “It is the hour now for you to awake from sleep. For our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed” (Romans 13:11). In the Second Reading, Saint Paul directs our focus to the ways in which we are not ready for the Lord to come, the ways we are complacent, doing the “works of darkness” (Romans 12:12)
Advent is a time to enter deeper into prayer, to go to Confession, to prepare seriously for the coming of Christ. As we reflected last week, Christ’s Kingdom is here and now, and we have the grace available to us to live in it. Sister, “Come, let us climb the LORD’s mountain to the house of God” (Isaiah 2:3). Let us make Advent count this year, so that when the Lord comes, we will have allowed Him to make us holy with His grace and with joy enter into the gates of the heavenly Jerusalem, our eternal home.
In Christ’s Love,
Susanna
Read the Readings for the First Sunday of Advent:
First Reading // Isaiah 2:1-5
Psalm // Psalm 122: 1-2, 3-4, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9
Second Reading // Romans 13:11-14
Gospel // Matthew 24:37-44
Live Liturgically // This Week’s Feast Days
Sunday, November 30 // First Sunday of Advent
Wednesday, December 3 // Memorial of Saint Francis Xavier, Priest
Thursday, December 4 // Optional Memorial of Saint John of Damascus, Priest and Doctor of the Church
Susanna Spencer holds a master's in Theology from the Franciscan University of Steubenville and is the Devotions Editor for Blessed is She. She is a freelance writer and editor and a teacher-in-training living with her philosopher husband and four kids in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She loves reading theology, attending beautiful liturgies, cooking delicious food, and casually following baseball. She is the author of the Gospel Studies including Seek His Kingdom: A Meditation on Matthew , Listen to Him: A Meditation on Mark, and Abide in His Love: A Meditation on John. She was narrator for Found: Advent With the Good Shepherd and Rescued: Lent With the Lamb of God and a contributing author and editor for our children’s devotional prayer book, Rise Up. She was the Theological Editor of the Blessed Conversations Studies. Find out more about her here.
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