ARCHDIOCESE OF PHILADELPHIA

Dear Friends in our Lord Jesus Christ,

During this past year all of us have experienced joys but also unsettling and difficult situations. We long for world peace and are preoccupied for the economy and for many other issues, such as genuine health-care reform. Some of us have difficulties in our families or in our work. Health and well-being have been a concern for many of us and our loved ones. All of us have had personal challenges. Precisely then at this moment, in this Christmas Mass, the Church repeats to us those inspiring words which we have just heard proclaimed in the Gospel—words that the angel spoke to the shepherds of Bethlehem: “Do not be afraid; for behold I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For today in the city of David a Savior has been born to you who is Christ and Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”

Once again I am privileged as your Archbishop to celebrate with you in this Cathedral Basilica the feast of Christmas and to proclaim to you the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This wonderful proclamation of His birth dominates our celebration at this Christmas Midnight Mass. The Church invites us to join in and to praise God for this marvelous event that touches the lives of all of us, takes away our fear, and gives us joy and hope and strength for Christian living.

This birth of Jesus Christ, which we see depicted in the manger, is described by the Church as a wonderful exchange. This birth is indeed a wonderful exchange between God and man.

It is through the Virgin Mary, the woman of all salvation history, that God takes on our humanity and gives us a share in His divinity.

Not only is this exchange wonderful, but everything about it is wonderful. The exchange is wonderful in the Child. Who is this Child? Who is this Child born in Bethlehem on Christmas night? This Child, whose name is Jesus, is both the Son of God and the Son of the Virgin Mary. This Child shares divinity with His Father. He is God like His Father. This Child shares humanity with His Mother and with all of us. This Child is true God and true Man.

Why is this exchange is so wonderful? It is because, in Jesus, God takes on our humanity and gives us a share in His divinity, His own divine life. In accepting Jesus, we become children of God, sharing in His divine nature as brothers and sisters of His Son, Jesus.

This exchange is also wonderful in the love that is at its origin. The reason why the Child came into the world, the reason why Jesus was born in Bethlehem is that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son to be our Savior. Love is at the source of the Father’s plan to send His Son into the world, so that His Son could assume our flesh, sanctify our humanity and then give us a share in His divine life.

But there is more! This exchange between God and man is also wonderful in what it brings to Christ. What it gives to the Son of God is wonderful. God, from all eternity, is the God of love. But at Bethlehem God begins to love in human flesh. And it is something new and wonderful for God to share our human flesh and, with our emotions and with our heart of flesh, to be able to love us with His eternal love. Yes, this exchange between God and man is indeed wonderful in the humanity that it gives to Jesus Christ.

And then, too, this exchange is wonderful in the consequences that it has for us. In Christ, in Jesus Christ, in the Child at Bethlehem, God’s solidarity with us, God’s solidarity with all humanity is complete and His love is total.

But, also, in the mystery of Christ’s birth, total also is the solidarity that Christ requires of all His brothers and sisters with the rest of humanity. Christ requires that He be loved in every human being by every other human being, because humanity is now united to God. Humanity is now united to Christ, and Christ will never allow Himself to be separated from those who share humanity with Him.

And this, dear Friends, is where our Christmas message leads us: to the consequences of this wonderful exchange. Our Christmas message leads us to humanity in need: to every brother and sister in need of Jesus Christ and His love, His pardon, His healing, His compassion, His Gospel of eternal life.

Our Christmas message leads us to every human being suffering from hunger and disease; suffering in body, mind and soul; suffering from war and hatred; suffering from natural causes and disasters, and those suffering from their own sins and the sins of others.

The Word, the Word of God became flesh and dwelt amongst us. He dwelt amongst us in Jesus Christ. And to all those who accept Him, He gives the power to become the children of God.

In our second reading Saint Paul alludes to all these consequences, saying that the grace of God that has appeared—this wonderful mystery of God’s humanity—trains us and challenges us, to live temperately and justly and devoutly, and to be eager to do what is right, what is right toward our God, what is right toward our brothers and sisters.

This, dear Friends, is our Christmas message. It expresses the faith of a Church that loves and cares for all human beings, because in Jesus Christ she adores an incarnate God who is the Word made Flesh and in whose humanity every human being is sacred, from the moment of conception to natural death, and every human right is inviolable.

This Christmas message—rooted in adoration of the newborn Savior, in adoration of the Child at Bethlehem—expresses a new commandment and a new commitment for us to defend, in His Name, the dignity of human life from whatever wounds or weakens, dishonors or destroys it. A new challenge emerges for us to work to uplift the human condition of all those who share humanity in common with the Son of God and who, in the Son of God, Jesus Christ, are destined for eternal life.

How important it is, dear Friends, for each one of us all during the coming year to be a part of the living, praying, worshiping, and serving Church of Jesus Christ. This is indeed a challenge for all of us—the challenge that comes to us at the birth of Jesus—the challenge of the wonderful exchange between God and man, between God and all of us.

Therefore, each of us must realize that everyone is welcome in the Catholic community. Everyone is welcome to come home to stay in the Church of God. Everyone is needed. Everyone is needed throughout the year, and everyone is called by God to participate in the life and prayer and good works of the Church. Everyone is invited by this great love story of God our Father to be part—to be an active part—of this wonderful exchange between the Son of God and His Church. Christ came to be close to all of us. He came to bring us into His Church, in which we are truly a living, praying, worshiping and serving people. Christ came at Bethlehem to call us to accept Him freely, and, in accepting Him, to accept His Church.

There is a place of honor for all of you, dear Friends, in the community of Christ’s Church, and Jesus needs you. He needs you here week after week to pray with Him, to serve with Him, to love others in His Name. A tremendous challenge! Yes, this wonderful exchange of divinity and humanity remains a challenge for us tonight and throughout the year. It is a challenge to all of us who have the immense privilege of being brothers and sisters of that Child in Bethlehem; that Child who is our Savior, our God; that Child who is the Son of the Eternal Father; that Child who is the Son of the Virgin Mary; that Child who is the Savior of the world.

The angel was right, dear Friends. The message is meant for all of us. Let us listen to it once again: “Do not be afraid; for behold I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For today in th city of David a Savior has been born to you who is Christ and Lord.” Amen.