Should an Advent Calendar have 12 or 25 Gifts?
Published in Gathering Magazine's 2022/2023 Advent/Christmas/Epiphany Issue
In Christianity, Advent (from the latin “adventus”, which means “coming”), is the liturgical season leading up to Christmas, and is a time of expectant waiting. It’s a time to practice living in the moment, patiently enjoying the feelings of excitement and anticipation, preparing for the celebrations to come. I think this intentional practice of enjoying the journey rather than rushing through life is something that resonates with many of us these days.
What is Advent?
Traditionally, Western Christian Advent lasts for 22-28 days, beginning on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, and ending on Christmas Eve. Lots of commercial and/or reusable Advent calendars have settled on 25 days, beginning on December 1st to make things simpler. But recently, 12 day advent calendars have become popular, drawing on the tradition of the Twelve Days of Christmas, especially for fancy things like beer, cheese, and yarn, which would be prohibitively expensive if we had to purchase all 25 (or more) items.
When is the Twelve Days of Christmas?
Modern consumer capitalism, with its holiday shopping season, and Boxing Week sales, has led to the common notion that the Christmas season ends on Christmas Day, following that the Twelve Days of Christmas must be the 12 days leading up to Christmas. But liturgically speaking, the Twelve Days of Christmas actually take place after Christmas, culminating on Twelfth Night on January 5th or Epiphany Day on January 6th. Epiphany is the Christian celebration of the three Magi visiting Jesus, bearing their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. It’s a celebration that has largely fallen out of memory in secular practice, though thanks to Shakespeare, is associated with gender queer, carnivalesque celebrations that were once popular in Elizabethan England.
Twelve Days of Advent?
Some people will tell you that if your Advent Calendar only has 12 gifts, you’re doing it wrong, and that what you actually have is a Christmastide or Epiphany Calendar. Not me. I think this is a really great example of how cultural folk traditions are messy and constantly evolving. Western and Orthodox Christians follow different calendars and celebrate Christmas on different dates, the length of "official" advent changes each year, even Christians who care about liturgical seasons don’t all agree on whether the Twelve Days of Christmas are counted starting on the 25th or 26th of December, and other Christian traditions used to celebrate the Christmas season for a full 40 days until Candlemas on February 2nd. We're allowed to play with our traditions, and let them evolve with our lives. I think imbuing Advent with the spirit of the Twelve Days of Christmas is a beautiful way to celebrate two traditions at once.
In my household, the festive season is a quirky interfaith time. If I had to put a label on my personal beliefs, I would say I’m culturally post-Christian with Celtic pagan spiritual leanings. My partner is an atheist with both Jewish and Orthodox Christian heritage, and he’s also Ukrainian, which means New Year’s is a bigger deal to him than Christmas, and Christmas is celebrated on January 7th instead of December 25th. We celebrate the winter solstice, both Christmases, and New Year’s Eve/Hogmanay. We put a Star of David on top of our Christmas tree, and light both advent candles, and a menorah. We honour the quiet days between first Christmas and New Year’s as a sacred time of rest and relaxation between bouts of festivity.
In my work life, I run a small business producing locally sourced, naturally dyed wool yarns and knitting patterns, and this work often overlaps and mingles with my spirituality. Last year I made a yarn calendar of 12 mini skeins of yarn for my customers that were dyed with seasonal plant dyes: black walnut husks that matured just as the frost set in, thistle - the last of the flowering weeds, and onion and avocado kitchen scraps. I kept a set for myself and knit a shawl during the 12 days between Western and Orthodox Christmas as a prayer shawl for the new year. This year I plan to find inspiration for my yarn calendar in old pagan practices that have been preserved in Christianized celebrations, like the Scandinavian solstice vibes of Saint Lucy’s Day on December 13th, and the apple tree wassail blessings that happen in southern England on Twelfth Night.
All this is to say, I invite you to make the Advent calendar tradition your own, whether that means opening your gifts in the lead up to Christmas, the days after Christmas, during Hanukkah, Lunar New Year, Kwanzaa, or corresponding to any other winter/solstice/new year celebration that’s important to you and your family.