Christmas Message 2009: 'We are brothers and sisters to one another in Christ'
- December 18, 2009
Each morning some of our daily newspapers lists the names and ages of some famous people whose birthday it is. After a number of years, I’ve noticed a pattern: the men and women with the best chance of making the list are actors, actresses and recording artists.
But December 25 will be different. It always is. Jesus Christ, a former carpenter turned street preacher, who died a criminal’s death at age 33, and who never had an album go gold, let alone platinum, will have a birthday—his 2009th. Our world will pause and celebrate this day–not always appropriately, but still taking notice, twenty centuries later. Why?
Because things and people are seldom what they seem at first. Jesus, the street preacher and healer, is actually the Son of God, born human like us in time, born of his mother Mary. We Catholics believe that God became human so that we could become the adopted daughters and sons of God. We are brothers and sisters to one another in Christ, now in this life, and forever with Him, and His Father, and the Holy Spirit of their love. Jesus was born, lived, died and rose again so that we could share God’s life in Him.
In a sense, then, Christmas is every Christian’s birthday. Because Jesus was born, each of us can be born again, with the promise of eternal life. But there is a condition: we must recognize Jesus and respond to him. And that response is not automatic or easy. The shepherds and the wise men did recognize how special Jesus was, and did respond to him. Others did not. Still others, like Herod, resisted and attacked him. That was true all over again while he went about preaching and healing as a man.
The lasting lesson of Christmas for us as Catholics is to be sure not to miss Jesus; to put it more positively, to be sure to recognize him and respond to him. We can recognize him teaching us in the Church, nourishing us in the Sacrifice of the Mass, forgiving our sins in the Sacrament of Penance, calling us to share our life of faith in our local parish, and asking for our help and encouragement in people around us who are in need.
That last example is sometimes the hardest way to recognize Jesus and respond to him: in other people’s needs. But Jesus put so much emphasis on it in his teaching that we need to keep trying. After all, our Savior most deserves the birthday gift he wants most.
Sometimes people’s needs are so great, they frighten us off: so many hungry, homeless people, and so little each of us can do; what to say to someone we know who is dying of cancer; someone so angry and bitter and alienated, we don’t know where or how to begin.
At other times, the needs are so simple we might miss them: the need for a friendly gesture; for a time of patient listening; for an encouraging or forgiving word. Whether the needs are great or small, we need to give of ourselves whatever we can, knowing that Jesus measures not volume but the caring of the heart.
We give thanks, then, for the Father’s gift to us at Christmas – Jesus His Son and our Brother. We pray for each other and for all the world, that together we may come to recognize him and respond to him in all the ways he gives us. Most of all, we give thanks for our own birth into the life of heaven that comes to us through the birth of the infant in the crib. A joyful Christmas to all of you, and, in a very real sense, Happy Birthday!
Most Reverend George H. Niederauer
Archbishop of San Francisco
From December 18, 2009 issue of Catholic San Francisco.
