You're listening to Catholic Sprouts, the daily podcast for Catholic kids that strives to plant seeds of faith.

Today's podcast is brought to you by OSV Kids. Today's podcast is brought to you by OSV Kids, a magazine designed to help children grow in their faith throughout the liturgical year.

To find out more, head to OSVKids.com. Hey there, Sproutes. Today is Monday, November 29th, 2021. Today is also the first Monday of the

first week of Advent. Today is also the first Monday of the first week of Advent.

Today is also the first Monday of the new year, according to the church calendar.

So happy new year.

That's right.

Yesterday, the first Sunday of Advent started a new church calendar.

Now, today we are going to talk just about Advent.

All week long we'll be talking about our beautiful Catholic faith.

But for today, my only goal is to remind you that Advent has started and to help you jump into Advent so that you're truly able to welcome Christ on Christmas Day.

So there are three beautiful practices that our church encourages us

to embrace during Advent. And those include embracing the darkness, waiting, and preparing.

So first of all, the darkness. Now, if you live in a similar part of the world that I do,

then the days are getting much shorter and it's getting colder. And at night when you sit down to

dinner, the sun is no longer shining, but it is dark. Now, this is a beautiful thing that

aligns with Advent because Advent, it is important for us to realize that the true light of the world is Jesus Christ and that He is coming on Christmas.

For this reason, we have an Advent wreath. In that Advent wreath, there are four candles, one for each week of Advent.

So today, in the first week of Advent, we are only lighting one candle.

And you'll notice that that does not give off very much light.

But as we move through the weeks, we'll light the second, the third, and the fourth candle, more light.

And then on Christmas Day, the world will be flooded with the true light of the world,

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