The Meaning of Christmas as Advent Draws to a Close
BENEDICT XVI
GENERAL AUDIENCE
Paul VI Audience Hall
Wednesday, 20 December 2006
The meaning of Christmas
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
“The Lord is close: come, let us adore him”. With this invocation, the liturgy invites us in these last days of Advent to approach as it were on tip-toe the Bethlehem Grotto where the extraordinary event that changed the course of history took place: the birth of the Redeemer.
On Christmas Night we will pause, once again, before the crib and contemplate with wonder the “Word made flesh”. Sentiments of joy and gratitude will be renewed in our hearts, as they are every year, while we listen to the Christmas melodies that sing of the extraordinary event in so many languages.
It was out of love that the Creator of the universe came to dwell among us. In his Letter to the Philippians, St Paul says that Christ, “though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (2: 6). He appeared in human form, adds the Apostle, humbling himself. At holy Christmas we will relive the fulfilment of this sublime mystery of grace and mercy.
St Paul says further, “When the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal 4: 4-5). In truth, the Chosen People had been waiting for the Messiah for many centuries but they imagined him as a powerful and victorious army leader who would free his followers from foreign oppression.
The Saviour, on the contrary, was born in silence and in absolute poverty. He came as “the light that enlightens every man”, St John notes, yet “his own people received him not” (Jn 1: 9, 11). “But”, the Apostle added, “to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God” (ibid., 1: 12). The light promised was to illumine the hearts of those who had persevered in vigilant and active expectation.
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