The Church is now celebrating the season of Christmas. Our eyes are turned to the babe in a manger who is to grow into the God-Man. There is something so sublime, paradoxical, and awe-inspiring about this grand condescension by God that many miss it. It is hard to fathom the Creator of the Universe choosing to take on human flesh and be born of a woman. It is truly a wonder that He would bring Himself into our sin and depravity. This is a great mystery because it is beyond our grasp in its fullest sense. It is a mystery of the Faith, but it reveals the great mercy and charity of the Blessed Trinity. Christmas is a journey into mercy. God came to meet us and bind our wounds Himself.
One of our oldest German Christmas carols sings: “This child is God’s own Son.” Here, something utterly immense, something we could never have thought up for ourselves—and yet, something that was always awaited, something necessary—has happened: God has become one of us. He has united himself to a human being so inseparably that this man is genuinely God from God and light from light, while remaining a true man.
Benedict XVI, The Blessing of Christmas, (B. McNeil, Trans.), pp. 125–126
God knew we needed nothing less than Himself. He entered fully into our experience, save sin, from conception to His death on the Cross and glorious Resurrection. No one expects God will come as a baby in a dirty stable. Wasn’t he supposed to come in Rome or some other great center? He could not come in such a manner lest we miss the greatness of His call to humility and the grand mercy He extends to each one of us. In our sin and darkness, we do not want to believe that we deserve such mercy and love, but in reality God calls each one of us and welcomes us during this joyous Christmas season and every single day of our lives. He wants to lead us to Himself. He wants to forgive our sins and weakness so that He can show us the way to peace and joy.
The eternal meaning of the world has come to us in so real a manner that we can touch him and see him (cf. 1 Jn 1:1). For what John calls “the Word” also means in Greek “the meaning”. Accordingly, we could perfectly well translate: “The meaning became flesh.” But this meaning is not simply a general idea that is inherent in the world. The meaning addresses us: the meaning is a word spoken to us. The meaning knows us; it calls to us; it leads us. The meaning is not a universal law in which we play some kind of role. It is meant personally for each individual. The meaning is itself a person: the Son of the living God, who was born in a stable in Bethlehem.
Ibid
Christ seeks each one of us as if we were the only person He created. His reason for coming, the reason we celebrate this season, is because of His desire to extend mercy to each one of us. His call to abandon sin is so that we may accept the gift of salvation and be united to the very purpose for our lives. In abandoning sins of the past, and striving to avoid sin in the present, we learn to accept His mercy.
Many people—indeed, in some sense, all of us—find this too good to be true. We are told: Yes, there is a meaning, and this meaning is not a powerless revolt against meaninglessness. The meaning has power. It is God. And God is good. God is not some remote highest being, forever inaccessible. He is very close to us; we can call to him; we can always reach him. He has time for me—so much time that he lay as a man in the crib and remains a man for all eternity.
Our invariable response is a doubt: Can this be true? Is it really possible for God to be a child? We are reluctant to believe that the truth is beautiful, for in our experience, the truth usually turns out to be cruel and dirty; and where this initially seems not to be the case, we dig and dig until our assumption turns out to be correct.
In the past, it was said that art serves beauty and that beauty itself is splendor veritatis, the splendor of the truth, its radiance from within. Today, however, many artists see their main task as unmasking man and showing that he is filthy and disgusting.
When we consider the dramas of Bertolt Brecht, we see that the author dedicates his entire genius to uncovering the truth—but no longer in order to show the radiance of the truth, but rather in order to demonstrate that the truth is dirty and that dirt is the truth. The encounter with the truth no longer ennobles: it degrades. This is why people mock Christmas and pour scorn on our joy.
Ibid, 129
The world looks at the birth of Christ and Christmas as a cruel joke or an impossible tale. How can it be true in the midst of so much suffering and sorrow? Why would God want to redeem such a barbaric and sinful lot as us? For many the response is scorn because of the deep wounds carried due to pain they have endured. This is precisely why our Holy Father has commenced the Jubilee Year of Mercy. Far too many people in the world do not believe mercy is possible, since so often we cannot give it ourselves. The real danger then becomes despair.
“His own people received him not” (1:11). Ultimately, we prefer our defiant despair to the kindness of God, which reveals itself in Bethlehem and seeks to touch our heart. Ultimately, we are too proud to let ourselves be redeemed.
“His own people received him not.” The abyss contained in these words goes far beyond the story of Mary and Joseph looking for lodgings in Bethlehem (a story that our children’s Christmas plays depict every year). This abyss goes far beyond the moral appeal to think of the homeless in today’s world and in our modern cities—important as this appeal undoubtedly is. These words of Saint John touch something deeper in us: the real reason why so many people in the world are homeless. Our arrogance closes the door on God and, therefore, on our fellow men.
We are too proud to see God. We are like Herod and his theological specialists: on this level, we no longer hear the angels singing. On this level, we may find God either threatening or boring—but nothing more than that! On this level, we no longer want to be “his own possession”—that is, God’s possession. All we want is to belong to our own selves. And this is why we cannot receive the one who comes into his own property, for that would oblige us to make a radical change and acknowledge that he possesses us.
He came as a child, in order to break down our pride. Perhaps we would have capitulated before power or wisdom …, but he does not want our capitulation: he wants our love. He wants to free us from our pride and, thus, to make us truly free.
Let us then allow the joy of this day to penetrate our souls. It is no illusion. It is the truth. For the truth—the ultimate and genuine truth—is beautiful. And it is good. When men encounter it, they become good. The truth speaks to us in the child who is God’s own Son.
Ibid, 131
We must share the joy that comes from our own condescension before the King of Kings. As Catholics, we must be sharing the answer that lies with the babe in the manger: Mercy. We must be willing to share with others our need for mercy in our own brokenness, sinfulness, and journey. Christ wants to enter our hearts and the hearts of our neighbor. He asks that we bring our sorrow and pain to Him that He may heal and restore us. He wants to show us the meaning of our lives. We need mercy and we must give mercy. It is our obligation to accept this mercy so that we may begin to conform our lives to the Most Holy Trinity. It is our Christian mission to extend and share this mercy with others that they too may find the meaning they seek. We must remember in the mockery and jeers of others this time of year; behind it all dwells a soul seeking Christ. Let us show the way to the mercy of the Nativity.