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Because
God wanted to be with us
PRAISED BE JESUS
CHRIST!
(Now and Forever)
He came in the stillness of the night. God was made flesh.
Pope Leo the Great,
who dates back to the fifth century, composed a marvelous Christmas
sermon. “In the fullness of time,” he said, “chosen in the unfathomable
depths of God’s wisdom, the Son of God took for himself our common
humanity in order to reconcile it with its creator.” That, my brothers
and sisters, is what we celebrate on the feast of the Nativity.
Pope Leo continued: “Beloved, let us give thanks to God the Father,
through his Son, in the Holy Spirit, because in his great love for us he
took pity on us, and when we were dead in our sins he brought us to life
with Christ, so that in him we might be a new creation. Let us throw off
our old nature and all its ways and, as we have come to birth in Christ,
let us renounce the works of the flesh.
“Christian, remember your dignity … Bear in mind who is your head and of
whose body you are a member. Do not forget that you have been rescued
from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God’s kingdom.
“Through the sacrament of baptism you have become a temple of the Holy
Spirit. Do not drive away so great a guest by evil conduct and become
again a slave to the devil, for your liberty was bought by the blood of
Christ.”
How much more dramatic could it be? A child is born in a cave,
unpretentious, poor. To be sure, there were signs that this child was
not just another baby. Angels announced his birth to the shepherds, and
later the Magi would come, but the basic fact remains that this was a
baby who was born because God wanted to be with us. The birth of Jesus
was and always shall be a sign of God’s profound love and a quiet
indication of how important we are to the Triune God: Father, Son and
Holy Spirit.
The feast of the Nativity is affirming, reassuring and full of
challenges. One of those challenges is to remember who we are. We are a
lot of different things. We are fathers and mothers. We are sons and
daughters. We are children and teenagers. We are blue-collar workers and
doctors and accountants. Some among us have terminal illnesses and fear
that they may never celebrate another Christmas. Some are alcoholics
struggling for recovery. Some are confronted with family problems and
sex problems and job problems and church problems. Some are lonely. Some
are on the brink of despair. Some see themselves as just ordinary people
who are trying to live up to their responsibilities one day at a time.
Some have been seriously tested, while others are yet to be tested.
As divisive as we are, those of us whom God has blest with the gift of
faith have one thing in common. All of us share one basic reality that
puts everything else into perspective. It is that we are loved by God,
loved so much that he chose to become one like us and live among us.
Christmas then, regardless of what it may mean to others, for us is
about the mystery of the Incarnation: an illustration of God’s immense
love for us and why it is a turning point in human history. The birth of
Jesus Christ celebrates God’s determination to free us from the chains
of sin and prejudice. We no longer need to be victimized by national or
world affairs. We need not fear the darkness of a world filled with
injustice, violence and suffering. While our life is affected by what
happens around us and to us and our loved ones, through Jesus Christ we
can rise above the muck of a world that so often seems cruel.
God calls us to the feast of the Nativity to praise him and to give him
thanks. We thank him for our blessings. We praise him because he is who
he is: a God of immense love who holds each one of us in the palm of his
hand.
Each day of our lives let us give thanks to God the Father, through his
Son, and in the Holy Spirit; who, in the immensity of his love reaches
out to us regardless of where we are or who we are … simply because we
are … a reflection of his image and likeness … a product of his creative
genius … a son or daughter redeemed by Jesus Christ. |
