First published on an LP in 1954. Published on YouTube with the kind permission of the archive of the Central European Province of the Jesuits (http://provinzarchiv.jesuiten.org). The Advent meditation can be read in K. Rahner: Kleines Kirchenjahr. Munich 1954, pp. 5–11, and K. Rahner: Komplett Werke. Vol. 7: Der prayende Christ. Geistliche Schriften und Studien zur Praxis des Glaubens. Freiburg i. Br. 2013, 118–121. The passages from 2:34 to 9:51 and 24:14 to 30:47 are not published there. A commentary on the Advent meditation by Eva-Maria Faber Karl Rahner's Advent meditation begins (0:00–2:34) as soberly as possible with an interpretation of the term Advent as arrival and future. It begins almost "dogmatically" with an understanding of history that traces the path from the hopeless past via the event of salvation to final redemption. The point is not in this process, but in the "interweaving" of existence and extinction, of possession and expectation. The Advent liturgy brings together the stretched dimensions of time in a single present of memory and anticipation or expectation. Rahner deepens the talk of a hopeless past (is not world history always already the history of salvation?) in a philosophical reflection on time (2:34–9:51), which cannot give birth to finality from itself and, as a mere progression into the endless, would be condemnation to something always provisional and never complete. The redemption of time has come about through the "act of God" (9:51–11:28), but should not remain a mere fact. How can the believing person gain an appropriate understanding of his historical situation? It is as if Rahner himself is still searching for ways to pave the way from an externally encountered content of faith to an internally realized self-understanding. In this way he spells out (11:28–16:45) the existence of the believing person in the present filled with God's Advent: salvation comes from the past into his present, and his present is already secretly filled with the future. Rahner thus formulates the appeal to grasp what is thought and believed as one's own reality. As if Rahner himself had doubts that this was enough, he begins again to internalize what has been said even further (16:45–31:31). The change in the people addressed implicitly or explicitly is striking. At the beginning of the meditation is the church's "we" as the bearer of the Christian faith. For the first internalization, the focus turns to the individual believer. Then a new "we" appears, the "we" and "one" integrated into the seasons. Here (for the first time) Rahner seeks out, in simple language, the experiences in which he suspects an openness to the message unfolded previously: the disappointment about the time of the world taken for itself, the "melancholy of time" in the tides of the year and everyday life, the cruel failure of abundance that is lost again. Then the thought breaks into an "I" and the address to a "you". The "I" existentially experiences the exhausting ups and downs of time, the bitter and hard taking; it is afraid of time slipping away. Rahner wants to encourage this "I" to believe that time, which devours life, does not have the last word. What is more, he appeals to the experience of such an Advent in words that are reminiscent of the well-known texts about the "experience of grace" (24:18–30:48, not in the published text). He recalls those moments in which people were able to let go of themselves, only to experience how time stands still and, instead of running into the void, welcomes eternity. Does Rahner's meditation reflect a contemporary attitude to life? For Rahner in 1954 - not least in his discussion with Martin Heidegger - arrival as the Advent of God is the redemption of time from the mere continuation of the ever-provisional. Since then, different attitudes to life have emerged in Western Europe. 50 years later, the secular idea of ​​arrival represents, for the sociologist Gerhard Schulze in his book "The Best of All Worlds" (Munich 2003), the possibility of moving from the logic of increase to a self-sufficient shaping of what has been achieved. Another 20 years later, such satisfaction has collapsed into radical uncertainty. It is much more likely that there is anxiety in the face of a limited time. Would an approach like that of Johann Baptist Metz (1928–2019) be more appropriate today to guide political and worldly engagement? When asked where resources lie in times of crisis to counteract feelings of powerlessness and resignation, Rahner's existential approach remains relevant. Above all, it is fundamental to concrete action to overcome despair over futility through hope in the advent of God in the midst of man's self-losing, seemingly futile efforts.