by Father Anthony F. Raso
JUST WHEN WE are ready to set sail and take out boats northeast, or maybe northwest, along comes the Word of God telling us to set sail due north, period. We think that we know where God wants us to go but it turns out that He wants us to go in a very different direction, to a very different shore.
So it is today on this beautiful solemnity of Christmas. It is surely a uniquely beautiful day but not in the homey and comfortable way we want it to be but in the challenging way God wants it to be.
At the Vigil Mass of Christmas, St. Matthew’s Gospel tells us about how the ages awaited the coming of the Messiah and then how finally He came to us because of the faith of Mary and the goodness of Joseph. At the Mass at night, the most beloved Gospel of them all is heard as He is born in the stable and the angels sing out their joy to the shepherds. At dawn, that Gospel continues with the arrival of the overjoyed shepherds and their joyful departure as they go back to the hills, “…glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen.”
Now then, one would think that the Gospel for the Mass during the day, the Mass which most of us attend, would take the lead and continue to the next logical note — and we’d be right, because it does. However, it is somewhat jarringly not the note we expect, not the northeast or the northwest journey in which we’d chose to travel but the northern path that God wants us to embrace.
Light Shines Right Here, Now
All of a sudden, there we are at the beginning of the Gospel of St. John: No Mary, no Joseph, no angels no shepherds. Jesus is there sure enough — not as the Baby lying in the manger, but as the Lord Who was there at the beginning of time and Who stood on the shore of the Jordan, awaiting His baptism by John and the beginning of His public life. As a matter of fact, this “northerly direction” is the message God has for us today: The Savior came to us as promised on that holy night and when He did, angels sang, shepherds rejoiced and then a new star appeared in the heavens. All of this happened in all of its beauty but now it is time for the next beautiful thing to happen. Now, the Light of the World is shining, not on Mary or Joseph or shepherds or wise men once upon a time, but upon you and I, right here and right now.
“He was in the world, … but the world did not know Him. He came to what was His own, but His people did not accept Him.” As the gospels of other days tell us, this is all too devastatingly true: Angels sang, shepherds rejoiced and wise men followed His star when He was born but later on, people would line the streets of Jerusalem shouting “hosannas” on a Sunday just to turn around and reject Him the next Friday. “…But to those who did accept Him He gave the power to become the children of God, to those who believe in His Name, who were born not by natural generation not by human choice nor by a man’s decision but by God.” St. John is speaking about himself and the other Apostles and disciples, but not just about them. He is also speaking about those who are gathered together in their churches on this Christmas Day. He is speaking about us.
Our Gift and Mission
Now that Advent is over and the lovely day of the birth of Christ is being celebrated, it is time — not tomorrow, or “someday” but today — to set sail in the direction in which God wants us to go and to use this beautiful Christmas Day to remember the significance of the gift given us in that stable long ago. As the author of the Letter to the Hebrews asks us today, “…To which of the angels did God ever say, ‘You are my son, this day I have begotten you?’” To be an angel must be a constant joy; to have been a shepherd in the hills that night had to have been an experience of the greatest happiness. We, however, are more lucky than that: We are Matthew and Mark and Luke and John. We are His Evangelists now, and our work has only begun.
We are His witnesses in the world now, send to be as Isaiah puts it today, the “sentinels” who “…raise a cry” and “shout for joy, for they see directly before their eyes the Lord restoring Zion.” The joy we are experiencing on this precious Christmas Day cannot just be something we feel at Church and at home today and then forget tomorrow. We must never forget how much God has done for us in sending His Son that first time, long ago, and we must help our sisters and brothers to join us in preparing Him when He comes again.
We are not in this world just to save our own souls any more than a sister or brother in a family is satisfied when she or he has enough to eat or is warm enough inside the house. Until every brother and sister is fed and is warmed by the fire of God’s love, our work is not yet done.
The Child in that manger is reminding us of that today: “All the ends of the earth (must) behold the salvation by our God.” It is our task now, on this Christmas Day, to proclaim by our lives that we have seen His glory, “…the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth.”[hr] Readings for the Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord:
Isaiah 52: 7-10
Psalm 98: 1, 2-3, 3-4, 5-6
Hebrews 1: 1-6
John 1: 1-18[hr] Father Anthony F. Raso is the pastor of St. Sylvester’s parish, City Line.