Christmas Message from Fr. Daniele
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December 23, 2020CHRISTMAS MESSAGE FROM FR. DANIELE
“A COVID CHRISTMAS”
“While they were there, the time came for her to have her child, and she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.” (Luke 2:6-7)
Usually we look forward with great joy and anticipation this Season of Christmas - and we busy ourselves with all the preparations we are used to this time of year: attending large Christmas parties, battling long lines to get our Christmas gifts and preparing our menu for hosting or attending a Christmas meal with our families. This year - many of those usual Christmas traditions will not happen, or have had to be scaled down. Maybe this brings with it a difficulty in trying to find joy in this Season when everything around us is just not the same.
But, things have never been the same. Since the day Jesus was born on this earth - things were never the same. At the birth of Jesus, God became man - humbled himself to be like us - in all things but sin. That means, not just in some things - but truly in all things - our sadness, our disappointments, the feelings we have of missing the company of our family and friends, our longing for our parents, children or grandchildren who live far away and cannot visit this year, our fears, anxieties and loneliness - truly in all things.
The birth of Jesus should remind each of us that we never live life alone, despite our own feelings that say we do, and despite the challenges and disappointments we face. By becoming like us, God has gone to extraordinary measures to prove his love for us by
revealing himself in Jesus, so he continues to use extraordinary measures to win over our hearts each day of our lives - even in the middle of a pandemic.
While there may not be large family gatherings this year, let’s do something that wasn’t even done on the first Christmas - and make room for Jesus to enter our homes. Let’s let him reveal himself to us and allow him to journey beside us in all of the many mixed
emotions we will experience this Christmas. Let’s let him assure us that no matter what happens around us - worldwide pandemic or personal pandemic alike - that from that first Christmas morning, our lives were never meant to be the same - but were meant to live with him, in him and through him in all things, like he did for us.
On behalf of Deacon Allan Charette and our parish staff, I wish you all the many blessings of Christmas and hope the Lord may fill us with his great love this Christmas Season and into the New Year!
Fr. Daniele Muscolino
Pastor, Holy Name of Jesus & St. Alphonsus Liguori