(noun) from the Latin ad-venio, “to come to” is
observed in many Christian churches as a time of
expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of Jesus’
birth at Christmas. In this year’s Christmas teaching series,
Christmas ADVENTure we are going to focus on navigating the
adventure towards the Christ of Christmas.
This advent season we have specially selected chrismons decorating
our church in celebration of the Christmas season. A chrismon is a
Christian symbol that represents Christ or a closely related Christian
theme. The word chrismon is comprised of two Latin abbreviations
connected in one word: Christus monogramma (Christ monogram).
During this season, we will be featuring some of these chrismons in
our weekly program and provide some of their background and
meaning to Christians through the centuries.
This symbol is known as the triquetra and is a design that
represents the Trinity: the single God expressed in three persons,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The triquetra is composed of three
arced lines of equal length that meet in three points, reveal a three
sided triangle in the center, and which can be drawn with a single
line.
This is an ancient monogram for Christ and is one of the most
recognizable of Christian symbols. It is known as the Chi Rho and
is pronounced ‘kee-row’. The symbol consists of the first two
letters of the Greek word for Christ (ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ). In some cases, the
Rho (P) is dropped from the symbol allowing simply the Chi (X) to
function as an abbreviation for the name of Christ. This is where
the historical abbreviation of for Christmas (Xmas) comes from.
Stability and peace were some of the hallmarks of the Roman
world and this symbol, Pax, is the Latin word for peace. The Pax
Romana provided an environment where the gospel could move
freely between cities. This chrismon represents the hope of peace
to all the world through Christ