One of my childhood memories from Christmas Day each year is very simple, yet rich and profound. At some point during Christmas Day, my father would pause and say with joy and gratitude, “The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day!”
Amidst all that happened on Christmas Day — the gifts, the food, the gatherings with family, the memories made and shared — I remember my father’s statement as one of my deep Christmas memories. As a child, his statement refocused me momentarily, and I was reminded to honestly remember God on that day.
As an adult, I have come to a deeper and greater appreciation of my father’s statement. Today, it reminds me to look to the Lord on Christmas Day, and thank him for his many blessings, the blessings of Christmas joy and its many manifestations, and the many other blessings that God showers upon us not only on Christmas Day but every day of the year.
In so many ways, we learn the wisdom of our parents the older we get. With such knowledge and insight into the wisdom of our parents, I make this statement on Christmas Day and other holidays. But as I remember my father and dive into the deep spiritual richness of his statement, it bears a unique sentiment on Christmas Day.
“The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day.”
Christmas Day and the entire Christmas season are indeed a time of grace and holiness. Like no other season of the Church’s year, Christmas can inspire even the adult human heart to seek to become a “child” again in the presence of God. Many Christmas memories and rich traditions have been etched deeply into our hearts. At Christmas, we are invited again to root ourselves in the love of God, revealed in the child born at Bethlehem.
In one of the prefaces for Christmas, we read the following regarding the birth of Jesus Christ in Bethlehem: “For on the feast of this awe-filled mystery, though invisible in his own divine nature, he has appeared visibly in ours; and begotten before all ages, he has begun to exist in time; so that, raising up in himself all that was cast down, he might restore unity to all creation and call straying humanity back to the heavenly Kingdom.”
Christmas calls us back to the heavenly Kingdom, to all that God has promised to those who follow in the footsteps of the child born at Bethlehem. Coming to us as one like us, the Incarnation of Jesus Christ and his birth at Bethlehem ushered in the beginning of a radically new experience of God’s love for us.
In the birth of Jesus Christ, our relationship with God was forever changed. In the silent watch of that first Christmas night, God bound himself through Jesus Christ to us by a bond that cannot be broken. Christmas Day and the Christmas season offer many graced opportunities for us to be reminded of and to renew this relationship with our God. It is good to know that the joy, peace and hope of Christmas are ours once again to celebrate and receive. It is good to know that for these reasons and so many more, we should rejoice that “The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day!”
In these days of our Christmas joy, may you and all of those you love truly experience and then share with others the great love God has shown for us in the birth and gift of his only Son. May the New Year hold only the fulfillment of God’s wonderful promises of joy for our world and for all humanity.
Please know that all here in the Archdiocese of Louisville will share a special remembrance in my celebration of the Eucharist on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
I wish a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all! Peace be with you!
Comfort My People — ‘The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day!’
One of my childhood memories from Christmas Day each year is very simple, yet rich and profound. At some point during Christmas Day, my father would pause and say with joy and gratitude, “The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day!”
Amidst all that happened on Christmas Day — the gifts, the food, the gatherings with family, the memories made and shared — I remember my father’s statement as one of my deep Christmas memories. As a child, his statement refocused me momentarily, and I was reminded to honestly remember God on that day.
As an adult, I have come to a deeper and greater appreciation of my father’s statement. Today, it reminds me to look to the Lord on Christmas Day, and thank him for his many blessings, the blessings of Christmas joy and its many manifestations, and the many other blessings that God showers upon us not only on Christmas Day but every day of the year.
In so many ways, we learn the wisdom of our parents the older we get. With such knowledge and insight into the wisdom of our parents, I make this statement on Christmas Day and other holidays. But as I remember my father and dive into the deep spiritual richness of his statement, it bears a unique sentiment on Christmas Day.
“The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day.”
Christmas Day and the entire Christmas season are indeed a time of grace and holiness. Like no other season of the Church’s year, Christmas can inspire even the adult human heart to seek to become a “child” again in the presence of God. Many Christmas memories and rich traditions have been etched deeply into our hearts. At Christmas, we are invited again to root ourselves in the love of God, revealed in the child born at Bethlehem.
In one of the prefaces for Christmas, we read the following regarding the birth of Jesus Christ in Bethlehem: “For on the feast of this awe-filled mystery, though invisible in his own divine nature, he has appeared visibly in ours; and begotten before all ages, he has begun to exist in time; so that, raising up in himself all that was cast down, he might restore unity to all creation and call straying humanity back to the heavenly Kingdom.”
Christmas calls us back to the heavenly Kingdom, to all that God has promised to those who follow in the footsteps of the child born at Bethlehem. Coming to us as one like us, the Incarnation of Jesus Christ and his birth at Bethlehem ushered in the beginning of a radically new experience of God’s love for us.
In the birth of Jesus Christ, our relationship with God was forever changed. In the silent watch of that first Christmas night, God bound himself through Jesus Christ to us by a bond that cannot be broken. Christmas Day and the Christmas season offer many graced opportunities for us to be reminded of and to renew this relationship with our God. It is good to know that the joy, peace and hope of Christmas are ours once again to celebrate and receive. It is good to know that for these reasons and so many more, we should rejoice that “The Lord has allowed us to live to see another Christmas Day!”
In these days of our Christmas joy, may you and all of those you love truly experience and then share with others the great love God has shown for us in the birth and gift of his only Son. May the New Year hold only the fulfillment of God’s wonderful promises of joy for our world and for all humanity.
Please know that all here in the Archdiocese of Louisville will share a special remembrance in my celebration of the Eucharist on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
I wish a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all! Peace be with you!
Composer David Haas will perform in Elizabethtown