Start Living a New Kind of Year, by John M. Grondelski 

Living wholly in the civil, present, temporal world tends to blur our attention to the “bigger picture.” Trying to live according to the rhythms of the liturgical year gives us perspective: everything is not about the right now and the demands of the moment.

By John M. Grondelski, Crisis Magazine, Jan. 6, 2023

John M. Grondelski (Ph.D., Fordham) is a former associate dean of the School of Theology, Seton Hall University, South Orange, New Jersey. All views expressed herein are his own.

Christmastide has been in full swing but ends soon. Ordinary Time will begin next week, running until Ash Wednesday, February 22, which takes us—via the Paschal Triduum—to Easter on April 9. The fifty days of Easter end with Pentecost on May 28. Ordinary Time returns May 30, and the liturgical year ends December 2. Advent 2022 was the longest possible Advent the season could be; Advent 2023 will be the shortest: 21 days.

There is a venerable tradition in the Church for the deacon to proclaim the dates of major feasts during the upcoming liturgical year after the Gospel on Epiphany (especially when it is observed on its traditional date, January 6). The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops provides a model here. ….

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