The Immaculate Conception is considered such a blessed event that it is considered a Holy Day of Obligation. Because the Immaculate Conception is the patron of the United States, this feast day (like Christmas) is an obligation even when it falls on a Saturday or Monday. However, the Saturday evening Masses (5 and 6:30 p.m.) celebrate the Second Sunday of Advent rather than the Immaculate Conception. As Fr. Steve says, you can't get a twofer by attending Saturday night.
When we celebrate the Immaculate Conception, it is a common mistake to think we are celebrating the Immaculate Conception of Jesus. At Mass on the Immaculate Conception the Gospel is always the Annunciation. Because the Archangel Gabrial appears to Mary to tell her about the child she would have, sometimes people think
that is the conception which is called immaculate. But the Immaculate Conception is about her conception which prepared Mary for the Annunciation; the time where she would choose whether or not to participate in God's plan for salvation.
In the Gospel, the angel Gabriel says, "Hail Mary full of Grace." In Greek the word used, κεχαριτωμένη, is a perfect passive participle of χαριτοω meaning "to fill or endow with grace." The tense indicates that Mary was graced from the instant she first existed in her mother's (Anne's) womb (well before Gabriel visited) and ever since. It might be best understood as her being so full of grace that sin can not enter her.
The first Mass celebrating the Immaculate Conception will be Friday at 5:30 p.m. There will also be Masses Saturday at 6:20, 8:15, and 12:10 p.m.
Saturday night, starting at 8 p.m., there will be two hours of Eucharistic Adoration and prayer for the end of abortion as well.
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