A cynical French philosopher said that the holidays were “those occasions that we prepare for anxiously, spend uncomfortably and remember with nostalgia.”
    This sentence, which may describe the way the world celebrates its holidays, does not describe, and cannot describe the way we celebrate Christmas.
    We are not of the world. The world around us celebrates Christmas more and more excessively and less and less meaningfully, even trying to eliminate the public symbols that recall the reason why we celebrate it.

    But we have “a reason for the season.” To us, Christmas is more than just a holiday, it is one of the most important holy days of the Catholic calendar. At Christmas we celebrate the incredible, indescribable mystery that the almighty God, to save us from sin and death, decided to become a man, and for this reason to come to the world as a fragile, poor and tender baby.

    If God gives us the means, it is a great joy to celebrate Christmas with a festive spirit, with dinners and gifts. All these things emphasize that which constitutes the essence of this holiday: the happiness of knowing that we are redeemed by God, because unto us his Son is born, who is our brother, our little brother.

    And on this day, millions of us Christians unite at this celebration: some, like us, are blessed to celebrate Christmas with freedom and material means; but many others celebrate it in extreme poverty, in the midst of persecution or social marginalization, in countries where Christians are surrounded by a hostile majority.
    Nevertheless, we are all united in this great mystery of love and hope; and we all celebrate the only mystery of God’s love that has come to save the whole world.

    This reality is the one that should dominate our entire holiday, not only Christmas Eve, but the whole Christmas season, which the church extends until the feast of the Epiphany.
Christmas therefore is more than a “night,” it is a time to be full of joy and to thank God for a gift that is the most important gift we can receive — the gift of having God with us forever — and the gift we least deserve.

    If this spirit of faith is the spirit that is paramount at this season, each of us will become a lamp lit with love and hope that will shine before the eyes of men and women more than any Christmas decoration. The love of Jesus in us will lead us to practice charity in a concrete way this Christmas: to forgive those who have offended us, to help others be reconciled to each other, to care for those in need materially, emotionally, or spiritually.
    If we live Christmas this way, then it will not be just another holiday, like the ones ridiculed by the French philosopher.

    On the contrary, for us it will be a special holiday, an unforgettable time and an opportunity to gather spiritual energy so that the new year, 2008, will be full of blessings; not because of “luck,” but because we believe that if our lives are renewed by the grace of Christmas, we will have the inner energy to face the new year with happiness, hope and charity.
    I ask the Holy Family of Nazareth to grant everyone in our archdiocese and in the world a happy and holy Christmas, a Christmas that we will remember always, and a 2008 full of blessings and the fruits of love.