First Vespers of Advent

The Holy Father celebrated the first Vespers of Advent with university students from throughout Rome.  As they did last year, the event begins before the Pope arrives with an icon of Sedes Sapientiae (Mary, Seat of Wisdom).  The icon travels around different schools.  This year, the icon was brought in procession by some Italian university students.  After Vespers, it was taken out by students from Brazil.  The reason it is Brazil is because Brazil is the site for the next World Youth Day.

The Holy See takes videos of most of the papal events.  You can see their video here. 

The Pope's homily was in Italian, and is not yet available in English.  Among other things, he reminded the students that their desire for God is best satisfied in that place where God makes himself closest to us, in the Liturgy:

The liturgy, seen in its true spirit, is always the fundamental school to live the life of Christian faith, a "theological" faith that involves your entire being--spirit, soul, and body--to make you become living stones in the construction of the Church and collaborators in the New Evangelization.  In a particular way, in the Eucharist, the living God makes himself so near, by making himself the food that sustains us on the way, the presence that transforms with the fire of his love.

Here are the pictures from Vespers: