By Sr. Mary Thadavanal MSMHC –
In all ages there was no night as silent as this night: an awesome night, deep and full with all celestial beings gazing in humble adoration and awe-inspiring reverence at the breath-taking reality of God becoming man, and held in human hands; an unfathomable mystery!
This is Christmas.
Bursting forth in spontaneous praises the angels sang the symphony of heaven: Glory to God in the highest and peace to men of goodwill.
Yes, there HE is!
Lying in a manger, in transparent purity and radiant simplicity with arms open as if to say, ‘take me; I came for you’.
The shepherds tending the sheep, lying so close to nature, could hear the heavens beckoning them to move towards the ‘Light’. They did see His glory and worshipped Him, the King of heaven and earth, the Saviour of the world; a mystery they couldn’t grasp but feel in their depths. Life turned different for them since then; their inner yearnings were different, their conversation was different, their focus was different.
Anyone who meets Jesus Christ once cannot be the same – a radical shift takes place in their total outlook. What weak people consider precious is seen as ‘rubbish’ by those who have met Jesus Christ: Zacchaeus, Saul of Tarsus, Longinus, Ignatius of Loyola, Francis Assisi, Mother Teresa, besides the thousands we may have known personally.
Yes, Yahweh kept His promise.
He did send the Redeemer. He found one who stayed awake in unspeakable humility and simplicity; so transparent was she in grace and beauty and open to God’s designs in her life that she touched the heart of God with her Fiat, ‘behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done unto me according to your word’. In that one utterance, her entire being was bathed in heavenly radiance. In a flash, she was absorbed by the Divine and God descended into her womb. All heaven looked in amazement and adoration worshipping the unutterable tenderness of God moving towards man to fulfill His promise of the Saviour. Light from Light, true God from true God, consubstantial with the Father, He came down from heaven, for the salvation of the world. As He took His dwelling in the virgin’s womb, she was transformed. It was no longer, she, the teenager, budding forth into life, but the living God in the fullness of life living in her. The force of love in her was so strong that power beyond her carried her off in haste to her cousin Elizabeth who was in a sort of ‘darkness’ of shame, sadness, guilt, insecurity, fear, loneliness, uncertainty. The moment Mary’s greeting reached her ears heavenly brilliance shone in Elizabeth revealing to her the mystery of the Redeemer’s presence in Mary’s womb. Elizabeth’s son, the forerunner of Christ leaped for joy in her womb, sensing the presence of his Lord. A symbolism of what must happen when an evangelizer visits families and individuals carrying Jesus Christ in him/her.
I wondered why was the stable chosen for the Saviour to be born? Jesus himself answered a dear friend. ‘yes, I chose the stable for my birthplace because if I have to make you believe that I understand you, I had to be born like you. Still better I chose to be born in a lower level than the one you had, to be born. I chose the least and the last, to be in your shoes. I chose, to go through the experience of being rejected so that you could lean on me if you are ever rejected, of seeing the door shut before my mother’s face when her time was near for me to be born so that you can pour your heart out to me if you are ever turned away, of fleeing even as a tender baby to escape being murdered, so that you would know that I understand the pain you feel if you ever have to be a refugee, of being among the poorest who could afford only a pair of turtle doves to offer in the temple, so that you would know your God understands your poverty if ever you are poor, of choosing crucifixion, the most shameful form of death and going even further, choosing to receive all the flogging arbitrated by the law, being mocked as a king with a crown of thorns pressed into my head, spat upon and ridiculed, a situation no one would have to go through. I went through these experiences for you while I could have been anything else, being of the lineage of King David. There is no sorrow of yours, no pain, so struggle, no deprivation, no aloneness that I cannot understand. My arms are open to embrace you, my heart is open to forgiving you, my house is open to shelter you forever, to fill you with riches no moth can destroy and no robbers can steal.
He is Emmanuel, God with us!
Two thousand years and more have gone by since that historic event which gradually began to make its effect felt. Human beings have come and gone. History has new pages written in sequence. Changes in different forms and names have taken place affecting human lives adversely or positively. Most significantly, thousands and millions have been impacted by Him and laid down their lives for Him gaining life eternal. However, with the emergence of modernism and shift in priorities the event of the birth of the ‘Saviour of the world’ has lost much of its significance to ritual ceremonies, colours and merrymaking, drinks and parties, holidaying and unbridled freedom which takes away ‘peace’ from many hearts and hearths; the ‘peace of heaven’ the newborn King came to gift to the world and to every heart.
Satan who can’t stand the reality of humans occupying the place he has lost forever has successfully made many inroads into human minds. His hatred and jealousy drive him to prowl around frantically like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour (1 Pet 5:8). Trapped in his maze, human beings, made in the image and likeness of God have been pushed away from the source of life, unable to get out easily. They are caught up in the pursuit of happiness, knocking at wrong doors, meeting disappointments and greed, in succession, continuing the rat race. The earth, bereaved of its original beauty, and ecology, its harmonious balance is the proof of this mad rush. The human mind, lost in the hustle and bustle of thoughts supplied by Satan and the ‘progressive’ world, cannot pick up the signals of the soul pining to get connected with the Creator lying in the manger.
But God never gives up
The compassionate God who knows how weak human beings are and how tricky Satan is has provided graciously for Christ to be born in our lives daily, by gifting us the Holy Eucharist.
In giving us his Body and Blood (his life) sacrificed on the altar of the cross he gives us his entire being, his will which became one with the Father’s will, his spirit which gave him the courage to accept with serenity the most painful death unheard of in human history with even a moment of seeming absence of his Beloved Abba!
Jesus said, “I have longed to eat this Passover with you before I suffer” (Lk 22:15) … Jesus took bread, said a blessing and broke it, and gave it to his disciples saying, “Take and eat: this is my body”. Then he took a cup, and gave thanks, and passed it to them, saying, “Drink this, all of you, for this is my blood, the blood of the Covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins…” (Mt 26:26-28).
Don’t we want to grab him and let him stay in us impacting our lives with his ever-radiant presence, thus letting Christmas go on, ever fresh in our personal lives? Standing before us in simple bread form, the living God tells each one of us as He told the virgin of Nazareth: ‘Do not fear, …, God has looked kindly upon you. The Lord desires to make His dwelling in you in real flesh and blood. He will rule over your heart and your life and His reign in you will have no end; it will continue for all eternity… for with God nothing is impossible (Lk 1: 30-33)’. It’s like saying, ‘have you room for me in your heart? Can I be born in you in the Eucharist and grow in you so that you can take me to the world I long to save?