Nativity of the Lord, Christmas Eve

Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/122510a.shtml

“No more shall people call you ‘Forsaken,’ or your land ‘Desolate,’ but you shall be called ‘My Delight,’ and your land ‘Espoused.’ For the Lord delights in you and makes your land his spouse…and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride, so shall your God rejoice in you.”

Today is the day of the celebration! The day when we, the Church, rejoice because we know who came to save us. We celebrate His coming, and mark this day to remember when defeated sin on our behalf. Forever I will sing the goodness of the Lord.

This is a day we spend with family; we exchange gifts, warm-hearted feelings, and try to think of only good things today. Today of all days throughout the year we try most to ignore or dispel the darkness in our lives. A lot of that is cultural habit, a tradition that has been reinforced through Christmas movies and music and tv, etc, etc. But some of that, especially for believers, is that this is the day God chose us once and for all, and not just a few chosen ones, but the whole world. Jesus died for the Israelites and the Gentiles, the ones who love Him and the ones who don’t. It is in honor of that generosity that we do our best to be our best on Christmas day, even if we don’t realize it.

In the second reading, Paul preaches to the Jews in their synagogue, and says “God, according to his promise, has brought to Israel a savior, Jesus.” While on the surface this is such joyful news, it is in essence a challenge. We often don’t want our hopes realized, because we have to live up to what we hoped for. If we realize success, we must act appropriately and wear the burden of success in all our other actions. If our savior comes to us, we must act to give Him all honor and support, and live in the way we promised Him we would.

That day has come for us. It is always here, but today on Christmas we are faced with the fact that our Lord, Jesus Christ came to us. He comes to us now, knocking on our hearts. We cannot ignore Him, and we cannot ignore what He stands for. He stands for love, that He loves us so completely as to come to us out of Heaven. He stands for forgiveness, because our sins our wiped away by the suffering He would undertake. He stands for mercy, because we do not receive the punishment we deserve from our sins. He is our hope that has come, and because He has come, we must live up to that love, forgiveness, mercy, and hope.

It is scary to live up to goodness others show us. It is so much easier to be mean when others are mean. Can we bear such love as God’s, that can only be responded to with equally infinite love, that takes us to the finite limits of everything we have?

This is why we have the model of Joseph, who though a good man, was still just a man, whom God had need to tell “Do not be afraid.” So to us, He says “do not be afraid,” but with faith accept Christ, and rejoice in His coming, and love, love with a boundless heart because He did so to us first. Let us celebrate His love with love.