Most of us when we are young have someone we look up to or idolize. It could be an older sibling, a crazy uncle, a teacher, a coach, a famous athlete or performer, perhaps, even our parents. We may try to imitate their speech or their mannerism or their singing. It is all part of discovering who we are and who we want to be in life. The one exception to that would be God. Who could God possibly look up to? God is all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful, all-everything and has been that way from before time began. If God were to look up, he would only see empty space. That is universally true except for one night of the year. That is Christmas night. On Christmas we are not looking up to God. God is looking up at us. God is a tiny baby lying in a crib. What might that baby be saying to us? Let’s listen in.

“Is this any way to treat God? Doesn’t it bother you that a newborn baby is left in a feeding trough? If you though a loaded diaper smelled bad, get a load of this bed of straw that animals have been slobbering in. Yuk. I don’t blame my parents because there were no beds available. They got turned away. We had no choice but to come here. Caesar Augustus, the wealthiest and most powerful guy on the planet, decided to hold a census, and we all know what that’s for: count them, tax them, draft them, enslave them. We had to go to dad’s hometown to register. Ninety miles and mom nine months pregnant. You ever travel ninety miles on a donkey? They don’t come with shock absorbers, you know. Then, nobody came to see me except nasty old shepherds. Everybody else is using me as an excuse to run up credit card debt and get drunk at the office party. How did my heavenly father talk me into this?”

Maybe that is not exactly what Baby Jesus said on that first Christmas night; but I am not so sure it is not the message that God wanted to send that night. God, the all-powerful, all-knowing, all-seeing creator of heaven and hearth could have been born anywhere. He could have booked the Presidential Suite at the Palmer House. God did not have to lower himself as far as he did. I believe he did so to draw attention to what we had allowed to happen to the world God created for us. God did not create a world in which marginal people like Mary and Joseph become pawns in the hands of the rich and the powerful. We did. God did not decree that the richest nation on earth should have 650,000 homeless people in it. We allowed that to happen. God did not create a world in which millions of people have fled their homeland for safety or economic survival. We did that. God did not create a world in which religion is used as a weapon to start wars or treat people as objects of hate. We did that.

At Christmas God did not come yell at us in a thundering voice from Mount Sinai or as an avalanche to bury us or as a flood to drown us. Yes, God promised never again to destroy the world with a flood, but that may be a bit academic, since pretty soon we may be able to do that to ourselves. God did not come as an old scold but as a baby, to try to awaken the love and compassion that lives within each one of us—a love and compassion that too often gets buried under anger, disappointments, resentments, and our self-centered ways. God said to us at Christmas, “ If you can love me as a baby, could you please love all of my brothers and sisters?”

At Christmas God left his superpowers behind in the hopes that he could work his way into our hearts. If we let him in, he will work with us to fix up this little planet. He will free us from our cynicism and old guilt and sins new and old and give us new hope for ourselves and for the world.  All the things we do to celebrate Christmas with our family are wonderful: the traveling, the decorating, the cooking, the gift-giving, the ugly sweaters). These are all ways that we show love for one another as a family. But the biblical story of Christmas pushes us beyond family and into a deeper love for all humanity. So, after all the Christmas leftovers have been eaten, and all the out of town company has left, and all the Christmas decorations have been put away, let’s not forget what the angels sang, “Good news for all the people” (not just some of the people). Let’s see if we can make that baby’s trip to earth worthwhile.

On behalf of our Servite Community at Assumption and our parish staff, have a truly blessed Christmas.

                                                                                     Fr. Joe