Free printable Advent Jesse Tree crafts, activities, coloring pages for Catholic Christmas countdown

Advent is the Catholic Christmas liturgical season leading up to Christmas. For four weeks, we pray, fast, read Bible passages on the gospel Christmas story and give alms to the poor. The theme of Advent is to prepare our hearts for the coming of Jesus. One way is to pray an Advent calendar. Another, related to the Advent calendar is to follow a Jesse Tree.

The Jesse Tree is an ancient visual aid the shows the lineage of Jesus. The basis comes from the Old Testament Bible passage "a root shall spring up from the stump of Jesse's lineage." This Bible foretells the birth of the Messiah and that He will come through Jesse, King David's father. . During Advent, symbols are hung on the Jesse Tree to represent Bible characters and people in Jesus's family tree.

Here are free printable Jesse Tree devotional activities. Each night, have children color one symbol place it on the Jesse Tree. Do this as you light candles on the Advent wreath and candles and read and pray from the Advent calendar. The Jesse Tree ends by adding images from the O Antiphons, another ancient Advent to Christmas series of prayers.

Life Your Way has a set of free printable Jesse Tree ornaments with Biblical symbols. 

ERIERCD has several pages of Jesse Tree coloring pages to print free. Print in black and white and have kids color. Jesse Tree ornaments include apple tree (Adam and Eve). Ark and rainbow (Noah), tent (Abraham), cradle (Sarah), coat (Joseph), stone tablets (Moses), Harp (David), ladder (Jacob), tambourine (Miriam), crown (Solomon), anchor (Ruth) lion and lamb (Isaiah), mallet (Deborah), trumpet (Joshua), lion (Daniel), well (Rebecca), house (Elizabeth), lily (Mary) hammer (St. Joseph) Chi Ro (Jesus). The Reformed Church in America has more free printable Jesse Tree symbols to color. Catholic Icing has more printable Advent Jesse tree crafts. 

1+1+1=1 has a free printable Jesse Tree booklet with devotions, prayers and crafts to make. The Jesse Tree can be made in many ways. In times past, it was a Christmas tree. Some families use a tree made of paper or a cloth banner with detachable ornaments. In our family I use a small table top tree with child-made ornaments and symbols. We add one each day.

Free printable Catholic All Saints Day activities for kids to enjoy instead of Halloween

Most people know that October 31 is Halloween, or All Hallows Eve. Fewer know that there's only a Halloween because of the days that follow. November 1 marks the Catholic holy day of obligation, All Saints' Day and November 2 is All Souls' Day (celebrated as Dia de los Muertos or Day of the Dead in Mexico). Halloween was a pagan blowout that anticipated the fasting of the proceeding holy day.  Use these free printable Catholic saints coloring pages, crafts and lesson plans to learn more about All Saint's Day and Halloween.
* Catholic Mom's All Saint's Day activities page has printable crafts and coloring pages specific to that holy day, plus tips for celebrating a Christian Halloween. Visit the Catholic Kids home page for free printable liturgical lesson plans for CCD and religious education lesson plan. Each week's gospel is discussed and age-appropriate activities linked: free printable puzzles, word searches, study sheets, crafts, Bible verses, games and activities. 
* ABCatholic has a free printable Catholic alphabet coloring book with images of saints, Bible stories and sacraments.  
* Waltzing Matilda features handmade free printable Catholic saints coloring pages. The blog moderator has drawn images for sacraments and liturgical use also. 
* Paper Dali is another mom blog with homemade free printable saints coloring pages. Some are free and some must be purchased.free her Etsy shop. Scroll around for the freebies. All are very attractive and well worth the nominal fee. 
* Catholic Icing offers handmade All Saints' Day printables and crafts. Read through the blog posts and sidebar menu for crafts, games and printables. 

* JClub has free printable Bible and Catholic saints coloring pages. * EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network) Kids offers free mass readings, prayer activities, crafts and coloring pages for children. Users must create a free account with user name and password. 

Free Printable Jewish Calendars and Calendar Converters

Calendars help mark time, but not everyone follows the same calendar. The Jewish luni-solar calendar dates time differently than the western Gregorian calendar. Here are free printable lunisolar Jewish calendars and calendar converter tools. Calendars are marked with Jewish holy days. You can print monthly calendars for each month of the Jewish year. You can also print calendars cross-referenced with the western Gregorian calendar.

For free printable Jewish calendars, visit Printable Jewish Calendar. The 12 Jewish months of the calendar include: Nissan, Iyar, Sivan, Tammuz, Av, Elul, Tishri, Cheshvan, Kislev, Tevet, Shevat, Adar I (found only in leap years) and Adar. These months are listed in the order they occur within the Jewish calendar year. Their western equivalents are March-April: Nissan, April-May: Iyan, May-June: Tammuz, etc. Free printable Jewish calendars are dated for 5776, the current year in the Jewish calendar. Get equivalent free printable western calendars for 2016 and updated ones as each new year arrives. Free printable Jewish calendars include Hebrew holidays. You can print lunisolar Jewish calendars, with or without a calendar converter of western dates.

The Jewish calendar begins with Pesach or Passover in Nissan, but the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah takes place in Tishri (the seventh month which is equivalent to September-October in the western calendar). This is when the new year is numbered. It is difficult to make direct comparison between western Gregorian and Jewish calendars as the two calendars differ by orientation. The older Julian calendar which Orthodox Christians use and the later Gregorian calendar (western calendar now used) are solar calendars. They are based upon the earth's path around the sun. The Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar. It is also called lunisolar calendar because the Hebrew calendar reconciles the phases or cycles of the moon with the earth's orbit around the sun. See Abdicate for details on how the Jewish and Gregorian (western) calendars coincide and mark time. This site also has a free calendar converter tool to convert calendars written in English or Hebrew.

Jew FAQ or Judaism 101 explains the Hebrew calendar on several levels, from basic to more advanced. Sources agree that the Hebrew calendar has the least degree of error of all the calendars. Formulab has a free calendar converter tool with converts date in the Western Gregorian calendar to dates in Jewish calendars and from the lunisolar Hebrew calendar to Gregorian solar calendar. Use these free printable calendars and calendar converter tools in Hebrew school or in social studies classes for multicultural lesson plans. 

Free Printable Rosary Coloring Pages, Blessed Virgin Mary Devotions

Catholic and Orthodox Christians have a devotion to the Mother of God, the Blessed Virgin Mary. Our Lady taught to the Catholic faithful to pray the rosary--the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious mysteries--to turn the focus away from selfishness and onto her son Jesus Christ. Here are free printable Catholic rosary coloring pages and Marian devotional activities. The events in the rosary are called mysteries because they are so miraculous that human beings can't fully understand them.

Family in Feast and Feria has made available in free printable PDFs a lovely little Catholic rosary devotional booklet entitled "The Rosary Color Book" written and illustrated in 1949 by Ettore Fattori. These free printable Blessed Virgin Mary rosary coloring pages feature vintage image. They evoke a prayerful, devotional sense of peace. The booklet has a prayer and meditation for each of the Joyful Mysteries, Sorrowful Mysteries, Glorious Mysteries and Luminous Mysteries of the rosary (added by Pope John Paul about 10 years ago). Each mystery is followed by a coloring page depicting each event. The booklet is one single book, but each set of mysteries of the rosary opens separately. You must open each set of mysteries of the rosary from attached links.

The Joyful Mysteries of the Rosary include: The Annunciation of the Angel Gabriel (the angel announces to the Blessed Virgin Mary that she has been overshadowed by the power of the Almighty and bring forth a Son who will be savior of the world). The Visitation (the Blessed Virgin Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth who is carrying John the Baptist), The Birth of Jesus (Christmas), The Presentation of the Child Jesus in the Temple (for circumcision and blessing) and The Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple (Jesus, at 12 was found in the temple teaching the elders.) There are coloring pages for each

The Sorrowful mysteries of the rosary include The Agony in the Garden, The Scourging at the Pillar, The Crowning With Thorns, Jesus Carries His Cross, The Crucifixion. Free printable coloring pages details each sad event from the Bible story of the life of Jesus so they are called the Sorrowful Mysteries. Some of them are Catholic Stations of the Cross as well.

The Glorious Mysteries of the rosary include The Resurrection of Our Lord, The Ascension into Heaven, The Descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into Heaven, The Crowing of Blessed Virgin Mary Queen of Heaven. These are the events that show the divinity of Jesus, so they are called Glorious Mysteries. The Catholic rosary coloring pages were made before the Luminous Mysteries of the rosary were added, so here are other links for free printable Luminous Mysteries of the Catholic rosary.

This free printable Catholic rosary prayer book is written with meditations. It includes a place for the child to write a response or promise to Jesus while praying the rosary as she reflects on each mystery of the rosary. When you pray the rosary with children, encourage each family member to go off into a private spot to meditate. Ponder what Jesus and Our Lady may be saying to you. Write your response directly to them. For example, "My Jesus, I promise to love thee more, pray more faithfully."

Free Printable Lent Coloring Pages for Ash Wednesday to Holy Week

Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant Christians observe Palm Sunday which celebrates the Biblical triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem one week before His crucifixion. Palm Sunday begins Holy Week and the countdown to the Paschal Triduum (Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday or Easter Vigil). Holy Week culminates on Easter Sunday. 

Here are free printable Holy Week activities, Palm Sunday crafts, Easter printables and Bible coloring pages. Use as lessons in homeschool, Christian school, Sunday school or Catholic religious education.

DL-TK offers free printable Palm Sunday crafts. There are cut and paste crafts featuring Jesus, donkeys and palms. Sunday-School-Fun-Zone has several dozen free printable Holy Week coloring pages, Easter crafts, Bible puzzles and Catholic Christian holiday games. There are Bible verse memorization activities, images of people waving palms, a donkey and Bible character lessons. Print a countdown-to-Easter craft which for Holy Week.

Ministry-to-Children has eight free printable religious Easter coloring pages. These could be used as a Holy Week countdown. Give children one page color each day. When the pages are complete, they might be combined into a devotional prayer booklet. Catholic Mom has free printable Bible activities geared to each Sunday's gospel reading. All the guesswork for lesson planning and cross-curricular connections has been done for you. These printable units are useful for all ages from preschool through middle school. They're adaptable for special needs students, too. There are printable versions of the Bible reading, an accompanying coloring page, mass worksheets, fill-in-the-blank and crossword puzzles.

Catholic Mom is cross-referenced with specific webpages for holidays and feast days. There are links for crafts, readings, additional resources, printables and supplemental activities. Catholic Mom hasprintable activities for Palm Sunday, Holy Week and the Easter Triduum, including Holy (or Maundy) Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Vigil (called Holy Saturday) and Easter Sunday.  Palm Sunday and Holy Week fluctuate by year. March 29 was Palm Sunday for 2015.

Roman Catholic Holy Days, Feast Days, Liturgical Calendar and Church Seasons

Catholic Holidays and Holy Days; An Explanation of the Liturgical Calendar The word 'holiday' takes its origin from the term 'holy day'. Different faiths have various 'holy days' and seasons. In Catholicism, holy days also referred to as 'feast days', are organized around the Liturgical Calendar.
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