Christmas, Sun., Dec. 25, 2011
Fr. Anthony Brankin
Gospel: Luke 2:1-14 “You will find a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths”
(Full sermon text) If you are like me, there is at least one Christmas in your memory that stands out as the reference point for every Christmas. This is the one that you remember as most beautiful, most full of joy. This is the Christmas that holds the key to all your future Christmases. And actually I mean Christmas Eve.
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For me that special Christmas Eve happened when I was about eight. We were not a wealthy family at all. We lived in a bungalow just like the ones here in Berwyn. It was pretty normal—I think. Of course with five children, there were fights, and teasing and bickering.
Enough food and love
But we were always able to pull it all together in time for Christmas.
Now almost every Christmas Eve and Christmas—my father had to work because he was a policemen and therefore my mother, with five children under the age of 10, very much depended upon us to help her and to help each other. We didn’t have a lot of extra things— that’s for sure. But we were always warm and clothed. We had enough food and certainly we had enough love.
Now the Christmas I remember best began as the late afternoon dark began to fall all about the world. But the Christmas tree was all aglow with those big lights and the bubblers that we used to use in those days. They made it all seem so warm and comfortable.
My mother was boiling a pot of pasta for us. Of course there would be no meat in the sauce— for in those days it was forbidden for Catholics to eat meat on Christmas Eve. We so hoped and prayed that our Pa could get away from work for a few minutes and have supper with us.
Ohh! That would have made it the best in the world.
Pa was home
Well, that year–lo and behold! Ma! Pa’s home! Maybe it was for just an hour! But what joy!
Pa was home! What more could you ask of Christmas? We were all home. This was even better than a personal visit from Santa.
The windows were all steamed up from the boiling pots, and there was clatter and clanging as my sister set the table—and there was a palpable love. Ma was by the stove cooking and Pa was in his uniform nibbling a little from her pans. Everyone was home. We are all together— and happy. Could there be any more to life than that!
And that year—as if to complete the magic of the evening—after supper—my brothers and sister and I—tummies full of food and hearts full of excitement—sat on the couch looking out the window at the moon. We waited and we watched for hours because we had heard from the holy nuns in school, that if there was a full moon on Christmas Eve and if you looked long enough, you could see the Holy Family right there in the face of the moon! Sometimes I think we saw it—maybe it was our imagination—but oh what a beautiful Christmas Eve that was.
There were no fights—there was no teasing—we were actually good that night. But of course.
This was the night that Jesus was going to be born—and could there be anything more wonderful than that!
But there are many beautiful Christmases for all of our families. We all had them and have them. And our hope—every year—is that if we can give our children or grandchildren just one Christmas like the one we had—well—it would make it all worthwhile. And that is our prayer for all of our families.
What’s special about this Baby?
Now an atheist might come up and ask us, “Wait a minute! What is the big deal? Why are you all so involved with the birth of this Baby? Why should there be such warm and wonderful feelings and such magic in your homes and families? This is just a baby and there are a lot of babies born every day—every year—and even on December 25th! What is so special about this baby?
“Oh you say He is God? He is God made man? He is King of Kings? Well, how could you say that? Do we not see that He is born in a stable—with dirt and donkeys all about with and cows and soiled hay and spiders and mice and rough farmhands all around Him. What kind of king is born like that?
“And Joseph and Mary don’t look very royal either—actually they look pretty worn out—as well they should be. They could not even find an inn for this Baby to be born in! This is the creator of the Universe? You Christians certainly make a big deal out of this God who does not act like a God!” And then we would tell the atheist—“That is the secret of Christmas. Christmas is about God becoming like us—and maybe sometimes—and maybe often—that means God actually becomes poor.”
Not far away from us
You see, Christmas proves that God is not out there in space—somewhere far away from us and distant from our lives. God is not some all-powerful alien who simply endures us or merely tolerates us or even dislikes us. God is not some Universal Entity who regards us like a bunch of annoying worms under his feet!
No our God is here—in front of us—behind us—by our side and in our arms. He loves us so much that He wants to be like us—in our littleness—in our smallness and humility—in our poverty and suffering—and God wants to be like us, and for no other reason than that He wants us to know that He loves us. And being born a baby in a poor family and by assuming every detail of our poor lives He proves how much He loves us.
He has taken on our sufferings
If we are without money—He shall be without money. If we are hungry and cold—He shall be hungry and cold. If we are without shelter then He shall have no shelter—if we are without friends—then He too will become friendless—and so much so that He will allow Himself to be abused and whipped and mocked and derided and then placed high atop a cross to be pierced with nails and executed for our sins.
And that is why we marvel at this Baby at Christmas and why we thrill at His story and look back so fondly on the memory of past Christmases in our life. Christmas amazes us because it is a chance to meditate upon how much God loves us.
We realize that in that one little body—is the God who created the Universe—that He who was there when time itself began and who with His Father spun out the galaxies and suns—that He who dappled the black empty universe with millions of stars and billions of planets all twinkling down to us here below—that that God is here—but this time He is absolutely helpless—wrapped in swaddling clothes and sucking His thumb.
No other reason than love
Here in His Nativity, the Almighty, the All-knowing, the All-present Lord of the Universe—the Unmoved Mover is held motionless in the arms of His mother. And for no other reason than love.
He wants us to know that He knows what it is like to be a human. We are weak, so He puts on weakness. We are powerless and so He puts on powerlessness. We are sad and hurting—He is sad and hurting. We can come to Him because He knows us and we know Him.
He is not like any other god who springs from the mind of man. Our God is not like the God of the Atheists— or the God of the pagans and infidels—mean and spiteful and vindictive and terrible. Our God is different— and not at all as we would expect Him.
Speaks our language
And in that difference is the proof of it all. Because if there is a God—and only the fool says there isn’t—but that God would want to find a way to communicate with us—and what more effective way than to come as one of us to speak with us in the way that we can understand.
No one can ever say that our God doesn’t know what it is like to be human. Because our God does know!— and from the inside out! Because He was just like us—from His birth to His death!
That is how much the good God loves us.
Is it any wonder that Christmas is so special in our lives—because Christmas as we celebrate in our homes and with our families—is our first beautiful meditation on God’s beautiful love.