Advent Sunday

To thee, O Lord, have I lifted up my soul.  In thee, O my God, I put my trust; let me not be ashamed.  Neither let my enemies laugh at me: for none of them that wait on thee shall be confounded. Ps. Show, O Lord, thy ways to me, and teach me thy paths. Glory be...  As it was...  To thee... (Ps 24:1-3, 4a)

Our Advent Introit expresses emotions of both hope and fear, just as we waver between hope and fear - will God save us, will we be saved?

I rather like the Anglican collect for Advent, now available for Catholic use, which so well reflects the apocalyptic sense of this season, and gives us a digested summation of to-day's Epistle (Rom. xiii, 11-14a) and Gospel (St Luke xxi, 25-33):

Almighty God, give us grace that we may cast away the works of darkness, and put upon us the armour of light (cf. Rom. xiii, 12), now in the time of this mortal life, in which thy Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility; that in the last day, when he shall come again in his glorious Majesty (cf. St Luke xxi, 27) to judge both the quick and the dead, we may rise to the life immortal, through him who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, [one God,] now and [for] ever.   Amen.

The three words in square brackets are added in the Catholic Church's Anglican Use liturgy, according to The Book of Divine Worship.