hello, welcome to the mosaic. we know the cheerful christmas carol it's beginning to look a lot like christmas. you are probably hearing it in the store, on the radio ever since halloween. today we are going to change the lyrics to it's beginning to look a lot like advent. christmas is a beautiful destination. the path we take to get there is important. in fact, it's crucial. where are we going in such a hurry? if the answer is i don't know, i am following the crowds, checking the sales prices and heading to the sparkling lights, it may be time to slow down. our goal, our destination, our christmas means meeting god

himself in the flesh. are we ready for that? are we prepared? how can we prepare? we also know all of us that wonderful christmas poem that begins 'twas the night before christmas and all through the house. we will say 'twas the month before christmas and all through the house. the month is advent. through the house, through the school, through the church we can be preparing ourselves and our families for the deep meaning of christmas. advent is four lovely spiritual and educational weeks. our guests are two experienced catholic educators who will help us understand what we can do in the home, in the community, in the school, in our hearts to make a great christmas. advent is the shopping season, yes. but a wise priest recently wrote far more important is wrapping gifts is to unwrap ourselves in our hearts, to prepare to meet christ and live life as he wants us to.

we will take a brief break. after this, join us to discuss advent, our christmas. hey look, it's those guys. [music] jess: are you good to drive? shawn: i'm fine. jess: how many did you have? shawn: i should be fine. jess: you should be? officer: go on and step out of the vehicle for me. bud: see ya, buddy. good luck! so, it turns out buzzed driving and drunk driving, they're the same thing and it costs around $10,000.

so not worth it. hello and welcome back to mosaic. our guests are two catholic educators. marie bordeleau is the principal of saint hillary's school in tiburon. she is a experienced educator. six years the principal of the

school. sorry. 12 years in catholic school administration and principal of the school and prior to that a public schoolteacher and marie is the mother of a young son. she has a b.a. and m. a. and she is working on her doctorate in educational leadership. beyond her is marian conley. she is the principal of the saint cecelia's school in san francisco. been there six years as principal and 30 years as a teacher and is also an alumnus, alumni, i should say, and a grown doctor who is a nurse. >> pediatric. >> they are going to help us understand what advent is, what the preparation for christmas is. here is someone who posed this advent puzzle the other way. in the catholic church, how does it come before christmas. >> it is the beginning of the

liturgical year on christmas. i could say happy new year on december 1st. what happens is we go four weeks for advent. then there is 12 days of christmas. >> right. >> and then we go into ordinary times. there is six weeks of ordinary time, which will then be followed by the season of lent, which then leads us to the most holiest of weeks with easter. then it ends with ordinary time again until we hit advent next year in 2018. >> so in my intro i suggested we are all rushing towards christmas, and i think you would agree, but you are saying there is a season called advent that is the new year. it strikes me that if we treat it like the new year, there is a kind of impulse to sort of renew ourself, discipline, look at ultimate goals and all that

thing that goes with the new year. is advent part of that? >> advent is a time for us slow down. in the businessness of the real -- busyness of the real world, we are seeing christmas and the stores. christmas doesn't start until the 25th of december. so advent is our time to slow down, to take time to pray, to do good deeds for other people, and to really be family with each other and to do good things. >> now, i know that you both have in your schools and parishes really rich programs during advent in which people of all ages participate. you will give us some detail on. this let me ask you this. advent is not a new fangedled feat. it's an ancient christian practice? >> right. advent has been going on since the 5th and 6th centuries. i think what happened in our world, you know, it becomes about, unfortunately, the money and shopping and decorations when it's really not about

that. it's about preparing for the birth of jesus, which happened 2017 years ago. we are not saying that jesus is going to be born again, but it's the second coming. it's for us preparing our time and getting ready for our meeting with jesus. >> and lets talk about a couple of the tools of advent. the advent wreath, i think, is probably familiar to most people. i can show a couple of examples here if the camera can pick that up. the advent wreath is generally an evergreen kind of thing with four candles in it and you can tell us what the candles mean, i hope, and how they are used. i will slip this into the center of the shot, too. just to show everyone how simple it is, this is an ancient two pieces of cross wood that are the basis of the wreath in my family's house and my dad made 80 years or so ago. can you explain a little bit about this? >> yes. you notice the advent wreath is

greenery around it. it has three purple candles and a pink candle. so week one of advent, which this year starts on december 3rd, you would light the first purple candle. and that represents hope. that there is hope in our world. boy, in this day and age, do we need to keep that in our hearts, that there is hope. and it's often called the prophet's candle. week two, the following sunday, you would not only light the first candle, but you would also light the second purple candle, and that represents peace. and it's often called the angel's candle. now, notice that's purple. kind of royalty. the third week we actually light the pink candle, and the pink candle represents joy. and it's often called the shepherd's candle. they are out in the field gathering the sheep. that third week it's like, okay, great, there is joy.

and then on the fourth sunday of advent we go back and we light the third purple. so we now have all four candles lit. and that fourth candle represents love. and it is also called the bethlehem candle because christ was born right following that fourth candle. >> what we are talking about is a daily ritual that a family can do. i know in my church there is a giant wreath and we light it before mass. i think a family does this at the family dinner table every day? >> either that or after dinner or before they go off in the morning. it's a wonderful family time to spend reading a scripture or taking the gospel from that day and reading it together as a family. >> spiritual practice of some kind. there is another little habit or tradition called the jesse tree, which as i understand, and here is a photo of one of those samples, this is an

excursion into the hebrew scriptures to know about the history of salvation coming from that direction. this is also a daily thing that a family can do, am i right? hanging an ornament on it each day? >> that's correct. the jesse tree takes from the father of king david. his name was jesse. and he was anointed by the prophets to establish a royal family. 1,000 years later when jesus was born. so a great activity i know in many schools and we do this in our school, the children learn about the ancestors of jesus. so jesus is always represented by a star. and so the star would be, of course, at the top of the tree, just like your tree and probably most homes have some kind of a star. we look at the genesis and the key character, one of the key characters in genesis is the story of adam and eve. so you would represent that story often with an apple and a

snake. the children would then, you know, draw the picture and they would write adam and eve on it and then they would hang it on the tree followed by the next people, cain and abel. they are the next people in the bible. you go through genesis all the way through isaiah and you learn about the people in the old testament. the men and women that came before jesus. >> that's wonderful. another family activity. let's take a brief break. we will come back and learn about the next tool of advent. the advent calendar. >> great. thank you.

announcer: get caught buzzed driving, and you could do some hard time. woman: craig. knock it off! sorry, mom. announcer: it could cost you around $10,000 in fines, legal fees, and increased insurance rates, and that could set you back a few years. buzzed, busted, and broke because buzzed driving is drunk driving. welcome back. we are talking about advent, the path to christmas, which experienced educators responsible for the spiritual upbringing of children from age kindergarten on up. so marie bordeleau, principal

of saint hillary's grammar school, explain the rich program in your school. we looked at two tools of advent. one is the advent wreath. the other is the jesse tree. now we have something familiar to many people. the advent calendar. let me show a couple of interesting samples. people have the paper advent calendar. a thing you can put on the refrigerator and mark off. there is the circular advent calendar. you open a little door each day. i saw a couple that were very ornate. this is a facsimile of a german cottage. here you open a door each day of advent and read a scripture and see a painting. this wonderful item is an advent calendar that's a russian orthodox church. these run from the most simple to the most complex. marie, you brought one to show and to share with us. can i pick this up? >> sure. what we've tried to do, as mary

was explaining the history, very often with the kids trying to keep it very practical and relatable to their everyday life. so what we've done is in every classroom, this is a part of our christian leadership class puts this together for each one of our classrooms, and very often, like when i was a young lass, my mom would make -- and we would have one of these with pieces of chocolate in them. what we tried to do is they get enough sugar as it is, each class can pull a piece out every day and inside is a note about what they can do in honor of advent. so for the second day of advent it's let someone else go first in line today. and then the next day, on the third day, the class will open it up. excuse me. and say offer your forgiveness to someone who hurt your feelings today. each day they have something to honor the season of advent, to

show compassion and live the messages that we are trying to teach through the preparation for christmas. >> that hangs in the classroom? >> yes. >> and every day at a certain time they go through, the children participate? >> yes. >> that's wonderful. >> what we have tried to do through a couple of activities, this one included, is unpack the story of jesus' birth. so a couple of -- can i show a couple others? >> please. >> the other thing we tried to do is the catholic faith, as we know, has a long, rich history with many traditions, which are great. we need to make sure it's relatable to kids today. on the nativity scene we have qr codes. each of the kids have ipads as part of their education. they can scan these as a class and there is a message about advent they receive. so they are accessing information in a method that is exciting and engaging to then. bringing the catholic faith to

them in a way that they are used to. >> they are used to having the mobile device. it's part of your program. to put the catholic faith on that. someone pointed out the internet is the most fantastically -- it's the most fantastic museum that you could wish. every piece of art, every kind of music, every find of text is on it. people need to take advantage of that, i think? >> mm-hmm. >> and you have some other items here? >> i have more, yes. so the other thing, too, is i know families today struggle to find a lot of time to be a family in the busyness of their day. this is especially true during christmas. and so what we've done is created a family advent calendar that can be posted on the fridge. each day is a different way that the family as a unit can celebrate advent. a couple of items. on friday, december 16th, have

a family movie night and make popcorn and watch christmas together. just being a part of a family community. gather some friends and neighbors and go christmas caroling. cut and paste pictures from christmas cards received into ornaments for your tree. just ways of preparing and being together and doing activities that are simple and manageable and also to remind you to slow down. how many times do we hear families tell us, oh, we want to have a simple christmas this year? these are ways to remember to have a family christmas. can i keep going? >> please. >> the other part is advent and christmas ison about the coming of jesus. we cannot forget mary and her role. one of the things that is so important that we want to -- we encourage is remembering teaching our students that mary had a huge leap of faith and said yes. said yes to being the mother of jesus. joseph said yes to mary and

jesus. and so something we do is an activity called bringing mary's yes to the classroom. and watching kids and talking students through how they can say yes to god and jesus every day through their actions and what they do and say to each other and the world at large. that's part of what we do through the advent celebration. >> this is a text for teachers to use in the classroom? >> it's a guide. >> very, very nice. and i think that you, your parish, you said, has also kind of a rich history of things. >> right. >> various activities. before i let you get into that, i think we will take our next break and you can tell me about your parish and community. we will come back after this brief break and talk more about advent.

welcome back. we are talking about advent and the preparation for christmas. a key figure, of course, is mary, the mother of jesus, as was just mentioned here. i wanted to bring this out from my family's archives. this little lady, if you can see her, is mary. it's a statue made by my mother many years ago. it's the pregnant mary. there she is. i think this was something of a novelty at the time. i think renaissance painters

painted the pregnant mary. i don't know that we often really think of her in that way. and this my mother would place at the center of our advent wreath. she stood there going through pregnancy and we watched her. there is also the tradition, i think, of the empty manger where jesus hasn't arrived yet and so on. so the aspects of mary which you mentioned, her yes to god, is of great interest and i understand that there is a lot of advent functions that she's involved in and so on. now, in your parish, saint cecelia, you have a rich program of activity. can you tell us more abt that? >> right. as you said, there is many different things during the series of advent. december 6th is known as the feast of st. nicholas, who is like the predecessor of the modern day santa. so one of the traditions we

have adopted is on december 6th, if it falls on a weekend, we do it the friday before, every person in the school leaves out one of their shoes. their right or left foot. some helpers come in and put a little treat in their shoes. and we hear the reindeer horns and we hear the bells, you know, all of a sudden it gets quiet and the kids go outside the classroom door and inside their shoe they have some trees to celebrate st. nicholas. and like on that note, too, our young families are ground in our parish. it's a group of families where they have children five years or younger. we actually have a st. nicholas advent party. >> okay. >> rather than a christmas party. we do the advent. and st. nicholas comes. each child is asked to bring a

gift to the event. so as the child brings up a gift for another child and puts it under the tree, st. nicholas gives them a little token, maybe a little stuffed animal or just a little thing to, like, okay, you have just given a gift. st. nicholas is going to give you something. we have a feast and the families have a time for community. we also do an advent mass rather than like a big christmas pageant. it's an advent focusing on, again, the signs and symbols of advent or the people of advent. and the students in the primary grades, grades k through 3, are the actors. >> okay. >> for this pageant. and we do it around usually the second week of advent, on that friday. then on the sunday, they do it for the parish. and what's really wonderful is our men's club then provides a pancake breakfast for everybody in the parish free of charge.

we probably have 1,000 to 1,200 people come into the pavilion and celebrate advent as a community. it is really wonderful. also as part of that our students participate in the toys for tots program with the firefighters because there are so many families that go without. so our students in grades k to 6 participate by bringing in an unwrapped toy or puzzles for those kids. but our 7th and 8th graders actually help out our parish. parish has a giving tree. 900 ornaments on it. and our students, our 7th and 8th graders, about 140 kids in our 7th and 8th grade, they each take an ornament off that tree the first tweak of advent and they pray for that -- the first week of advent and they pray for the person listed on the ornament and then they bring a gift wrapped to put under that tree that then is

given, parents come and take the gifts and deliver them to the children. it's a really wonderful time of giving. >> that is wonderful. and as you mentioned here, these little items on your advent calendar are also about service, taking care of others, giving gifts. we are so consumed with getting, i think, and i think the children learn that because they want things, but this countervailing teaching that advent is a season of preparing for charity and practicing charity is really great. >> well, and part of our job is to be guides for the students on a faith journey and teaming them the gospel message. they are very egocentric in just developmentally. that's how the kids are at the age we are dealing with. they think how does this impact me? why is this important to me? and part whatever we do through advent is to encourage those habits of giving to others. to show compassion. to think of others before

yourself. and that's part of -- as we unpackage the story of jesus coming, which is what advent is, we encourage those habits. >> that is wonderful. the charity, the service, the spirituality, the prayers, understanding the bible, the old testament, the new testament, and deepening, i think, as i hear from you, deepening the family ties. you are both aware of the kind of fractured modern hectic family and how it has to find its center. it may not be the dinner table anymore, but it could be here, the spiritual practices, that make the family a little domestic church. >> well, six years ago when i was preparing to adopt my son, i had to go to family classes. >> yes. >> and to get certified as a foster parent within the state. one of the questions they asked as part of this is what are the traditions within your family that someone would know makes

you a part of that family? and it makes you really reflect on -- and a lot of the traditions i game up when i was reflecting on that question came back to traditions i have within the catholic faith. that's what we are creating for our kids and hopefully encouraging in our families. >> thank you. we are just out of time. thank you very much for watching mosaic on advent.

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the latest movie re stuff for the welcome back to "bay sunday." we have got everything from the latest movies to cool nature stuff for kids. first this morning, if you are planning to hit the slopes this winter, you've got to have all the right gear. here with tips and tricks for a safe ski season is alex hoy and johnny collinson. so you, johnny, i heard you went on a trip recently. tell us about it. >> yeah. so i grew up in utah, in salt lake city, been skiing since i was 2 years old and professionally for about 8 years. so, yeah, i kind of traveled the world looking for good snow and ki