Today is Ember Friday of Advent.
The Church commemorates today the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, with the Christ Child in her womb, to her kinswoman Elizabeth and the sanctification of St. John the Baptist in Elizabeth’s womb. The Feast of the Visitation is kept on July 2, but the Church brings this event before the eyes of the faithful today as a preparation for the birth of Him Whom the Virgin Mary carried in her womb into the hill country of Juda.
In 1962, Ember Fridays were days of complete abstinence, like all Fridays, and of fasting.
