One of the most-striking and evocative images of the Christmas narrative is of the Christ-child laid in a manger while his loving parents look on. What's striking about the scene is the evident vulnerability of a helpless child born to a poor family in a humble stable. It contrasts sharply with how one might imagine the birth of a king and certainly not how the Jewish people, longing for the promised Messiah, expected God to intervene in human history to save his people. In this way they had to learn that God is not as we usually imagine Him to be.
They had to change their ideas about power, about God and about man, and in so doing; they also had to change themselves. Now they were able to see that God's power is not like that of the powerful of this world. God's ways are not as we imagine them or as we might wish them to be.
God contrasts the noisy and ostentatious power of this world with the defenceless power of love.
At Christmas, we see a God who has drawn near to his people to lead them in his footsteps. It is a radical call to enter into the life of God. A call though inadequately lived and experienced, is as relevant today as it was twenty centuries ago.
The call of Christmas is a call to become people of truth, of justice, of goodness, of forgiveness, of mercy. A heart truly moved by the message of Christmas will no longer ask: how can this serve me? Instead, they will have to ask: How can I serve God's presence in the world?
While heavily veiled and diminished by scandal and weakness in the Church, in the banks and in the Government, God's presence is still alive in the world of Ireland, Christmas 2009. It is alive in the basic human goodness of people reaching out to help one another, it is alive in the love of a family struggling to make ends meet and it is alive in the hope for a better tomorrow.
Amidst the darkness of Bethlehem a light was born, that light whose name is Immanuel, God is with us, a God who keeps his promises, a God who is still with us: this is the source of our hope.
Have a safe and grace-filled Christmas.
