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December 25, 2013The first graders were presenting the Christmas story to their parents in the school hall. All the children had memorized their parts. The innkeeper was especially well prepared for his few words, “there is no room in the inn.” When Mary and Joseph arrived at the door, they were shivering and Joseph explained that they had come a long way, were tired, and that Mary was pregnant and ready to give birth to her child. The innkeeper faithfully spoke his line in a stern voice “there is no room in the inn.”
Mary and Joseph were deeply saddened and slowly turned away when the innkeeper was so moved that he cried out, “but you could stay in my room, if you like.” While his response was not in the script, his childlike invitation expresses the real meaning of Christmas, welcoming Jesus into the inns of our hearts.
We need, however, to get the Christmas story right. Yes, it is all about Bethlehem, the shepherds, Mary and Joseph. But that was a one time event. It took place in history with particular people and in particular concrete circumstances like poverty, cold, a manger and swaddling clothes. But the mystery of Christmas transcends these historical circumstances and has a reality today.
Actually there is an alternate account of the Christmas story told to us in the Gospel of St. John. It uses images very different from those we heard in the Gospel of St. Luke, and we might say that they illuminate the deep truth that underlies the scene that we have all been touched by and have come to love. John describes the event in these words: “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.”
Despite the cold, the messiness and poverty of the stable in Bethlehem the presence of Jesus, the Word of God, is life and light for humanity today and for all times. The swaddling clothes encircled a tiny human body that held within it the very life of God, a life that was to be shared with all other human beings. This is why the darkness of that night was dispelled. This is why shepherds are told not to fear for a Savior had been born.
The light that shown on that first Christmas night is meant to brighten our lives today, for that Savior born in Bethlehem lives today, he is Emmanuel God with us. He came that we may have a life free from fear, fear of death, fear of our own weakness and sin, fear of a world filled with much darkness and confusion. He is a light was not only for the shepherds and Wise Men, he is a light for our world today. His light – his Gospel of Joy, his Word, his healing love are all present among us to enlighten our lives as they have enlightened the lives of thousands who have followed that light over the centuries. They are meant, too, to enlighten and give peace to those who this past year have experienced darkness – the loss of a loved one, a broken marriage, the loss of job, a serious personal illness or addiction. He came to save us from these and bring brighten into lives today. This then is not just a history we are celebrating tonight; it is a mystery that affects our lives deeply, if we have faith.
No, nostalgia is not what Christmas is all about with plenty of food and gifts. It is important that we tell that original story and let us touch our hearts. But what we celebrate must be a present reality that impacts us 350 days a year, twenty four hours a day. Unless Christ is the light that shows us how we are to act each day, that points out the path we take and the decisions we make, Christmas loses its deepest meaning.
To return to the first grade presentation of Christmas, we must make room in our hearts for the presence of Christ, as our light and our salvation. Once we have done that we, then as his instruments are called to bring that light, that peace, that joy to others. Actually, we will only know the fullness of that joy when we bring his light into the darkness of others by our love, our attentiveness to their needs, our presence. Put another way: we must not only make room for Christ in our hearts, we must make room in our hearts for others who need him.