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 -  The Word - 

The Meaning of Christmas

Christmas cards and cribs. Carols and the world's best known birthday. How can we get behind the hoopla and see what we are celebrating today?

The birth of Jesus, no doubt. The birth of the best-known, most admired, most influential figure in human history. The greatness of the person, as well as the touching human setting in which He was born (a poor young couple away from home; the heartbreak of not finding shelter; the birth in a stable amidst cattle fodder; angels and shepherds; the Magi and a special star; ...) make Christmas one of the most touching human stories ever. It is easy to respond to the emotional charm of Christmas.

There is no need to be a Christian to get this far. Christmas, as Jesus’ birthday, is known and observed the world over. It is, for instance a public holiday in pre dominantly Hindu India.

We, followers of Jesus, celebrate much more than a birthday. We know that God's splendour shone through the apparently ordinary life of this child. From then on, to know God was to walk the path Jesus trod. God is best known not through clever speculation or elitist practices, but through the kind of life Jesus lived. Human life, especially of the poor, becomes the most sacred holy book, in which we read God's own story.

Revelation is no more a set of abstract truths. It is a person. A person like us in everything (expect sin) Jesus.

God literally becomes one of us, thus transforming us and our understanding of ourselves. We are no longer frightened slaves or employees calculating their reward. We are sons in the Son, with the privilege and the unmerited right to call god “Father”.

This is not poetry. Far from it! The revolution started by Jesus' birth turned slave owners and slaves into a family. Social status, linguistic and racial barriers, political opinions and power games all recede into the background before our all important birthright as God's sons and daughters. If God loved us to this degree, if God treasured us enough to become one of us, there must be much more to us than we normally see.

That “more” in us, this Treasure we hold in the fragility of our humanity, is both a reason for celebration and a call.

We sing for joy because God's unutterable tenderness becomes tangible, accessible in Jesus. This child is Emmanuel, God with us!

His birth is also a call. We look into our hearts and see the areas where Jesus still waits to be born areas where we are not yet Christian, dark and turbulent corners unswept by His love. May be, this Christmas we will give Him room. Hopefully, the name “Christian” will be less of a lie about us.

We look at the world around us this world that God loved so much that He could not Keep a distance from it. This world with all its beauty, its burden of sin and shame, its share of cruelty and pain, generosity and hope. God waits to be “born” again through us.

Christian prayer is not a servant's attempt to get his boss's attention. Nor is our message the nice story of a person long dead and gone. No, we celebrate Jesus coming today. We can let Christmas happen in us, around us. The liturgy is not a spectacle, not a mosaic of music and gestures; it puts us in the presence of the living Jesus.

May we, who will look up and bend low as we hear the words, “This is my Body,” open our eyes and see His body in the poor and the homeless, in the orphans and street children around us.

A star led three strangers to meet God in a setting they didn't expect to find Him in. May our eyes be open to see the glory waiting to burst forth in us and in lots of little Bethlehem’s around us. Given our assent, God can become visible and close to those who need Him. He can be “born” again. Christmas is meant to be so much more than cards and carols. It is Jesus meeting us today. And meeting those whom we meet today. May our eyes and hearts be open!

Reading at the Masses:
1. Midnight Mass: Isaiah 9:1 3, 5 6; Titus 2:11 14; Luke 2:1 14;
2. Mass at Dawn: Isaiah 62: 11 12; Titus 3:4 7; Luke 2:15 20;
3. Mass During the day: Isaiah 52:7 10; Hebrews 1:1 6; John 1:1 18.

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