Welcome to all of you reading this. Whether you are from Wichita or somewhere else, whether you are at Church every Sunday or find yourself only able to make it infrequently, welcome. Everybody belongs in Church on Christmas. Today we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, our Savior.
This year has shown us many things, but above all it has shown us that we need a Savior. Our world is full of things trying to kill us in body, soul, or both. This year we are acutely aware of our own mortality, our own weakness. I have thought often this year of the prophet Isaiah, who said, now the people that went about in darkness has seen a great light; for men abiding in a land where death overshadowed them, light has dawned. (9:2) If there were any doubt, Isaiah continues, For love of Sion I will no more be silent, for love of Jerusalem I will never rest, until he, the Just One, is revealed to her like the dawn, until he, her deliverer, shines out like a flame. […] No longer shall men call thee Forsaken […]; thou shall be called My Beloved, and thy land a Home, now the Lord takes delight in thee. (62:1,4)
For generation after generation, the Jewish people ponders the meaning of these prophecies. They expected a Messiah, a Christos, to save them from the imperial powers that continually ruled over them. What they received was so much more. Not just any savior would do. Only God himself, the Divine Word who was with God and who was God (cf. John 1:1), the Only Son of the Father, the one through whom all things came into being (1:3), the one in whom there was life (1:4) was capable and worthy of the task of redeeming his creatures, and that life came into the world and was the light of men (ibid.). And the Word was made flesh, and came to dwell among us; and we had sight of his glory, glory such as belongs to the Father’s only begotten Son, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14)
On Christmas Day, the eternal made himself subject to time. The almighty became powerless. The source of life put on mortality. The creator of all was born of his own creation. God, while not ceasing to be God, was born of a virgin and became man. St. Augustine wrote, “He was God from the Father, and man from the mother. […] From the Father He is the beginning of life, and from the mother he is the end of death. From the Father He ordains every day, and from the mother He consecrates this day.”1
God entered into this world not as the people expected, but as a helpless child, Jesus, the Christ the Emmanuel. He teaches us that forgiveness, not vengeance, is the way to true freedom. He teaches us not to fear death, because he will conquer it. The only thing worth fearing is that which can kill the soul. This event of his birth established his presence here on earth; his presence has never departed from us. We experience it through his Church, his Sacraments, and his presence in his baptized people.
Our Savior has come forth from the darkness to bring light into our lives and to be present in our lives. “The presence of Christ involves the beat of our heart: being moved by his presence turns into being moved in our lives. Nothing is useless; nothing is extraneous. We start to have an affection for everything, everything, and the magnificent consequences of this are respect for what you do, precision in what you do, loyalty to your concrete work and tenacity in persevering to the end; you become tireless.”2 This Christmas, let us begin to remember the presence of Christ in our hearts, so that his light and power might shine out through us to all the world. All the ends of the earth have seen the saving power of God. (Psalm 98:3c) May they see it through us.
- emphasis is mine, St. Augustine, “On the Nativity,” PL 194 in Quincy Howe, Jr., Selected Sermons of St. Augustine, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1966, pg. 49
- Luigi Giussani, as quoted on the 2020 Communion and Liberation Christmas Poster