Using a Perpetual Liturgical Calendar

I became a student of the liturgical year alongside the ten or so little faces of a Sunday school class. As the church intern, I was new to liturgy, not to mention the church year. I had no prior knowledge of the church year or what a perpetual calendar looked like. I only saw a wheel that looked like a pie chart with uneven slices. Though I recognized several of the holidays, I was immediately curious how the seasons and feast days all worked together in one calendar.

The perpetual liturgical calendar tells the story of Christ.

The church year is a very practical tool to present the people and events in the life of Christ. Week by week, season by season, we are invited to remember and embody the ancient stories in our contemporary contexts. Though the story of Christ remains relatively unchanged, followers are likely to gain fresh wisdom every year.

The colors and lengths of each season add more symbolism to the calendar:

• Purple marks Advent and Lent, seasons of preparation.
• White and gold mark seasons of celebration, like Christmas and Easter.
• Red marks the movement of the Holy Spirit.
• Green marks seasons of hope during Ordinary Time.

These colors, in combination with the particular period of days or weeks in each season, help the Church to visualize and experience the Gospel story with their senses.

The calendar wheel grounds us in the seasons.

The cycle of liturgical seasons reflects the three major themes of the Christian story: life, death, and resurrection. The circular shape of the calendar is a reminder these themes repeat themselves time and time again, even within a single week! Though the church rejoices in the empty tomb through the themes of life and resurrection, there is also ample space for death through grief, silence, and doubt.

A perpetual calendar grounds us in our own seasons of life, death, and resurrection. Whether a loved one died or your faith took an unexpected turn, the season of death could be a literal or figurative reality. Same goes for life or resurrection. But because we hold these three concepts together, we’re reminded our particular season is temporary. Resurrection will come, life will follow, and death can be expected again. This perspective is humbling. As we observe these themes in the story of Christ, we’re invited to share in the hope that God’s presence carries us through all things.

The calendar cycle marks the journey of faith.

Perhaps one of the greatest strengths of the calendar is its circular shape. Many are created without dates, which I find preferable since it reinforces that formation or growth occurs through repetition. Traditional calendars move our focus forward to the next day or week. The church year certainly has important elements of anticipation or forward motion, but there are many ways to understand time and not all ways must be linear.

Whether you’re learning a language or raising children, you know first hand that repetition is key to absorbing the vocabulary or teaching a life skill. We all practice something (many things) each day. The journey of faith is no different. The cyclical movement of the calendar reflects the natural cycles within learning, the earth’s rotation around the sun, daily rhythms, and even mensuration.

Ideas for using a perpetual liturgical calendar

• Hang a framed calendar in your home as either artwork or reference material.
• Print a calendar wheel to keep in your journal or scriptures.
• Share a liturgical calendar with a small group and discuss the current season.