A story is told about Pope St. John XXIII that every Christmas he would visit Rome’s Maximum-Security Prison (Regina Caeli Prison). He would tell inmates, “Since you could not come to me, I came to you.” The he would go on and explain how this was like Christmas. Since we could not go to God, He came to us.
This is the fact we celebrate today: ✞ God became a man so that by following a man – which is something we are able to do – we might reach that which, before Christ, was impossible for us.
✞ The eternal Son of God has taken on the fullness of our nature and has been born of the Virgin Mary.
✞ The Word has become one of us, so we might become children of God. He embraced the fullness of our nature in order to heal every aspect of it.
✞ If He had not been born in time, we would be dead for all eternity. Now, we are born to live, only one – Christ – was born to die.
Now, with this great feast of Christmas comes an awesome responsibility.
✞ We are called to follow the man Christ so as to reach God.
This is our task, our commission, our responsibility ✞ To use our gifts, our abilities to help transform our world.
What is needed for each of us is that ✞ We become the brothers and sisters of Christ and that ✞ We accept and embrace the gifts and the graces that God intends for us.
St. John wrote, “. . . to those who did not accept Him, He gave power to become children of God . . . “
This Christmas, as we recall the fact that since we could not go to God, He came to us, let us recommit ourselves to following His example.