Sunday, December 25, 2011

Christmas Message 2011 - Bishop Noel Treanor (RC)

Christmas Message 2011 

Bishop Noel Treanor
Down & Connor 

The Nativity, the birth of Christ, the Son of God as a human person, to a woman, Mary, is the focus of our Christmas celebrations.

In our homes, schools and Churches, the Nativity scene is at the heart of these celebrations.

At the centre of the Nativity scene in the lowly stable is the Infant Jesus.  Helpless infant, he is the adored focus of the loving gaze of the poor shepherds and of the Magi, the Three Wise Men. Shepherds and Kings – they are people from different backgrounds, worlds and cultures. 

In the middle between the rustic shepherds and the royal visitors, Mary and Joseph bend over the cradle, united in watchful love.

In this scene is reflected our society today: the poor to the one side and then a wide gap to the rich and the privileged on the other.

In that lowly stable all divisions are swept away, as each one there present shares in the transforming and unifying love of the Infant.

This Christmas is bleak for many in our society, bleaker than last Christmas.  Crisis and cut backs, fear of redundancies and unemployment threaten our livelihood and security.

Reconnecting with that gift of divine love alive and breathing in the infant Jesus, a love that united poor and privileged in shared devotion of the holy in the poor, helpless human infant, offers one essential key to tackling our predicament. 

This togetherness of the divine and human, the togetherness of worker and privileged king in prayerful adoration, engenders the spiritual energy and the insight that enable citizens and society to address and tackle difficult times and situations.

Our society is in distress. The trust placed in wealth, self-gratification, social advancement has not led us to a paradise. Rather than lead to happiness, their untrammelled pursuit has resulted in a broken society, extreme social inequality, depression, breakdown of the family unit, crime, suicide and the erosion of hope. A young generation grows disillusioned by the failure and unbridled greed of an older generation.

Night, they say, is darkest just before the dawn. We have a sense of being in a long and very dark night. And we are frightened by talk of yet worse to come. As ever these burdens fall heaviest on the poor and on the marginalised.

Yet Christmas Eve is followed by Christmas morning and that same Nativity Scene radiates hope for the future.

For that infant’s helplessness requires us to protect him – from hurt, from abuse, from injustice and from inequality. 

It is this same Infant in that cradle who became the Christ whose death and resurrection guarantees each of us the gift, the unconditional and freely given gift, of eternal life.

The stable of Bethlehem, with all gathered around the manger, is a powerful reminder that we too are all part of a community – that of the family, the parish , the diocese, our country  – that must come and work together for the good of all.

May our celebration of the Feast of the Nativity of Jesus Christ energise us in appreciating our Christian faith and in combating deprivation, social exclusion, poverty and the economic challenges of our time.