News

November 30, 2009

The joy of Advent shines at churches

By Steve Mocarsky smocarsky@timesleader.com
Staff Writer
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Christians began their spiritual preparation for Christmas on Sunday with the observance of the beginning of Advent.

Advent is a joyful period when Christians prepare for the commemoration of Christ’s birth on Dec. 25, according to The Catholic Light – the Diocese of Scranton’s newspaper. Advent begins four Sundays before Christmas.

Traditional ceremonies were conducted at churches throughout the world to mark the season, most commonly the lighting of a candle on an Advent wreath.

Altar server Emily Kneeream lit one of three purple candles on an Advent wreath of evergreen branches during Mass at Our Lady of Sorrows in West Wyoming after the Rev. Michael Marchetti asked for the blessings of God as the church “joyfully awaits the coming of its savior.”

The four candles represent the four weeks of Advent; one additional candle is lit each subsequent Sunday, Marchetti explained after Mass.

Three candles are purple and one is rose. The purple candles symbolize penance, preparatory sacrifices and good works at this time. The rose candle is lit on the third Sunday, Gaudete Sunday, a Sunday of rejoicing because the faithful reached the midpoint of Advent, when preparations are half over and Christmas is close.

Marchetti said the Catholic Church once observed Advent as a time of penitence, fasting and abstinence. After the second Vatican Council in 1962, the Church focused on it as a time of preparation for the incarnation of Christ.

In addition to the Advent wreath ceremony at Our Lady of Sorrows, Marchetti officiated over another at St. Joseph Church in West Wyoming earlier in the day. Marchetti also blessed packets of oplatki – unleavened wafers, available to parishioners after Mass for a donation.

Oplatki were in high demand at St. Joseph’s, where many parishioners are of Polish heritage.

Parishioner JoAnne Iwanowski Rygiel, 73, of Wyoming, said it’s a tradition for members of families of Polish heritage to break a piece off each other’s wafer while wishing each other well at Wigilia – the Polish word for vigil dinner – on Christmas Eve.

“It’s been done forever. It started in Poland when people had vigil suppers. They always broke bread. You wish each other well, and sometimes there’s really an act of forgiveness. Sometimes people who haven’t spoken to each other in a long time, when they come to vigil supper, they break the wafer and they break out into tears. It’s a very, very emotional thing,” Rygiel said.

And it’s not just Poles that follow the tradition. Slovaks and Italians have similar customs at Christmas vigil dinners, she said.

Rygiel said the foods at vigil suppers vary by ethnicity and family tradition.

“My grandparents came over here from Poland and they were mining families, so they didn’t have a lot of money. So we learned to love pirogies and the fish that was available. Vigil supper was usually a fish meal. We would eat things like dried peas and fruit compote because that’s what you used to do,” Rygiel said.

Our Lady of Sorrows parishioner Jackie Cegelka, 67, of West Wyoming, took home two packs of oplatki after Mass, even though she’s of Irish descent. Her husband, Jerry, is Polish.

The family stopped serving fish at Wigilia because the children didn’t care for it, Cegelka said, so her family focuses on cabbage soup and pierogies.

Mushroom or cabbage soup, sauerkraut with mushrooms, peas, buttered potatoes and fish are other traditional Polish staples at Wigilia.

“Now that people have jobs and they have more money, they save up and they have lobster tail. … But the most important part of the vigil supper is the gathering of the family and the extending of wishes for good health and a good life,” Rygiel said.

Rygiel recalled the year her uncle’s mother-in-law died; her grandchildren were happy they didn’t feel obligated to attend Wigilia at her house, as had been tradition. But that year, the grandchildren found “it just wasn’t Christmas without it.”

“When you grow up and get married, you come to realize that you create the holiday. And it’s what you do that makes the holiday and the memories for your children,” Rygiel said.

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