Christmas homily - Father Paul Daly

Christ-mas

What’s the first thing Luke tells us Mary did after Jesus was born? She wrapped him in swaddling clothes. Swaddling clothes kept the baby tightly wrapped and warm.

Unwrap joy this Christmas. That’s the slogan for Cadbury’s. There is something joyful about unwrapping a bar of milk chocolate and taking a bite. But that joy will pass, it will wear off. It is as nothing compared with receiving the gift that God gives us this Christmas, a gift also wrapped but in swaddling clothes, God’s gift which is Himself.

What does the Christ-child bring us this Christmas? Peace, joy, hope, love – we could list them all. But is that it? Unwrapping a chocolate bar can be to unwrap joy, as the advertisers remind us. What does Jesus bring that uniquely only Jesus can bring? He brings us God Himself, not simply a message from God but the very Word who is God, not simply a gift from God, but the gift who is God Himself.

In Jesus, born of Mary, God enters the world in person. God takes upon himself our human condition, our human lives, our human joys and struggles, our very living and dying too. He becomes one with us so that each of us can become one with Him.

And the good news proclaimed by angels to shepherds is good news for the whole world. If the Christ child brings only peace, joy, hope, love, then how can it be good news for those in the Middle East, mainly Christians, who are being persecuted and even martyred for their faith, a faith which has been in the Land of Abraham since soon after the time of Jesus?

Pope Francis has written to the Christians of the Middle East, those for whom, in his words, ‘the music of your Christian hymns will also be accompanied by tears and sighs.’ He writes: ‘I think with affection and veneration of the pastors and faithful who have lately been killed, often merely for the fact that they are Christian. I think also of those who have been kidnapped, including several Orthodox bishops.’ Pope Francis goes on to say: ‘Your efforts to cooperate with people of other religions is a sign of the Kingdom of God. The more difficult the situation, the more inter-religious dialogue becomes necessary. There is no other way. Dialogue, in truth and love, is the best antidote to religious fundamentalism, which is a threat for true followers of every religion.’

Pope Francis then urges the international community to take action to stop the violence and to promote peace. It strikes me that the western governments seem to have abandoned the persecuted people of the lands of the Bible, not just Christians but Yazidi and other people too. Given how wrong the Government got it last time, I can see the value of caution in intervening but I can’t see any value in doing nothing apart from dropping a few bombs. There appears to be no strategy nor any desire to create one. We might be celebrating Christmas but some of the oldest Christian communities in the world are living their long Good Friday.

Jesus, born at Bethlehem, doesn’t just reveal God to us, he also reveals the truest face of humanity. God makes his appearance on the human stage, entering in in the most vulnerable of ways, a baby born in fairly rough and ready circumstances, without the benefits of midwives and that professional care which, after two baptisms this year in incubators in the Royal Oldham, I know we should all be grateful for. Jesus was born in danger. Sadly, in today’s world, some children are in greater danger of their lives before they are even born.

The Christmas story tells us a great deal about the value of every human person. Jesus, though born with a roof of sorts over his head, was still homeless. Within a short time, this child fled for his life, with Mary and Joseph, and had to seek refuge in a foreign land. And that child, homeless, settling in a new place, was God Himself.

The image in the manger is only an image of the Christ child, made of whatever crib figures are made of. If you want a better image, look into the faces of your families and friends, look into the faces of the stranger and the newcomer, look into the faces of the needy and vulnerable and let us look, finally, into our own hearts and souls and see if we can see the face of God there too, and if that face of God is difficult to see or a bit smudged or out of focus, then let our prayer this Christmas be to let the Christ child be born anew in us.

For the gift offered to each one of us, lovingly wrapped by his Mother, is God Himself. Only when we receive that gift afresh can we share it anew with our world, with our local community and beyond. How will I receive this gift? Will I receive it like ‘the sweet and silly Christmas things, bath salts and inexpensive scent and hideous tie so gladly meant’ that John Betjeman wrote of? Or will I be grateful but within days or weeks the gift will find itself at the back of the cupboard waiting ten months till we can donate it to the Christmas Fair?

Or do we receive God’s gift of God himself with wonder and awe, offering God love from our hearts in grateful response to the infinite, boundless, unconditional love which God gives to us? All that God asks of us this Christmas is that we say ‘yes’, that we receive God anew into our hearts, that we resolve to journey with Him this coming year.

Jesus was once wrapped in swaddling bands, now risen and glorified he is with us in prayer, in worship, and above all in his real presence, his body and blood under the signs of bread and wine in Holy Communion. That’s the good news – that Jesus is with us – that he is as much here now as he was in the manger at Bethlehem. Do we see him? Do we adore him? Do we welcome him and carry him to others? If we truly welcome Christ this Christmas we will be truly unwrapping joy - for us and others to share.