Fr. Thomas Leitner celebrated the Christmas Day Mass. Click for a video of the entire celebration. The text of his homily is below:
Joh 1:1-18
Is 52:7-10
Heb 1:1-6
Focus: Since the first Christmas, the great God is present and real, ‘incarnated,’ in our world, even and especially at places where we would hardly expect it. Humility and patience help us to realize this.
Dear sisters and brothers in the Lord,
Here is a story that I would ask you to hear with the ears of your heart: As Josef and Mary were on their way to Bethlehem, an angel convened the animals in order to select a few who were supposed to help the Holy Family in the stable.
First, of course, the lion volunteered: “Only a king is worthy to serve the Lord of the world,” he roared.“I will tear to pieces anyone who gets too close to the child.” “You are too fierce,” the angel said.
Then the fox came sneaking along. With an innocent looking face he remarked,
“I will take care of them well. For the divine child I will procure the sweetest honey and for the young mother I will steal a chicken every morning.” “You are too sly,” the angel decided.
Now the peacock stalked along. He unfolded his wheel and his tail feathers shone brilliantly. I will adorn that poor stable more magnificently than Solomon adorned his temple. “You are too conceited,” the angel said. Many more animals came and praised their crafts and skills. In vain.
Finally, the strict angel looked around one more time and saw ox and ass serving outside on the field of a farmer. The angel called them, too. “What do you have to offer?” “Nothing,” the ass said, and sadly lowered his ears. “We have learned nothing, aside from humility and patience.” Because everything else earned only more beatings for us!” The ox shyly added, “But perhaps we could chase away the flies every now and then with our tails!” The angel replied, “You are the right ones!”
Today’s gospel expresses more profoundly than those of the other three Christmas masses the mystery of this feast: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” The eternal Creator God—today we would add: The One through whom the galaxies came into being—has taken on a human form. The Divine Word through whom the world has been created, though whom all things came to be, has been born in time. The only Son of God has descended from the Father’s side and now lays as an infant in the stable of Bethlehem. And He is the light for the human race, the light that wants to shine in every darkness!
Today’s second reading tells us that Christ is the fullness of God’s revelation.
God had spoken before in partial and various ways through prophets for centuries. Now God has spoken through the Son. Everything that was said before receives its fuller meaning through Him. He, in his ministry here on earth, is the refulgence of God’s glory.
Our first reading fits so well into this liturgy because it makes it clear that the coming of the Messiah, who will make known God’s salvation for the whole world, who will bring comfort to those who suffer, is a very joyful event, is glad tidings, good news and worth to be announced everywhere!
Dear sisters and brothers in the Lord, Since the first Christmas, our great God is present, real, and ‘incarnate,’ enfleshed, in our world, even and especially also at places where we would hardly expect it. In one Christmas letter, a friend of mine pointed out that we need the following keys in order to understand this mystery more in its depth:
We need the key of silence. We need to have a quiet moment of sitting down in front of a nativity set, a moment, in which we can receive what has happened at the first Christmas, the Divine Light, deeply into our hearts.
Secondly, we need the key of right listening. We need to hear God’s word with our hearts, because in Bethlehem God has opened God’s heart to us human beings.
Thirdly, we need the key of setting out. The shepherds and the wise men set out
and went to Bethlehem. God wants us to set out, too, and to seek and to find God in our everyday life, in events and in people, even where His presence isn’t obvious to us at first sight!
Fourthly, we need the key of adoration, of loving marveling about our God who took on our human nature in order for us to share in God’s own nature, as Pope St. Leo the Great put it in his famous Christmas sermon, which we heard at the vigil last night. “Do not forget, Pope Leo says, that you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God's kingdom … Christian, remember your dignity … Through the sacrament of baptism you have become a temple of the Holy Spirit. Do not live below your dignity.” A stance of adoration is necessary in the sight of this divine gift.
I would add a fifth and final key for opening the door to the mystery of the Holy Night: humility and trusting patience. Everything begins with humility, St. Teresa of Avila said. Our great deeds or qualities cannot buy us access to this mystery, however, we gain it realizing that everything is gift, that only empty hands can be filled. As we use this key, we are in a way similar to those animals who were selected as company for the holy family, the ox and the ass. As our nativity in this chapel was set up during the last couple of days, the ox and the ass fittingly arrived first in the stable.
St. Hildegard of Bingen once said, “God’s Son became a human being so that humans would have their home in God.” This is what we celebrate today. This is our truth.
~ Fr. Thomas Leitner