January 1--Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God

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Merry Christmas!  The feast of Mary, Mother of God is the eighth day of the Octave of Christmas.  January 1 was originally the Feast of the Circumcision, when Jesus was given his name in the Temple, as was the custom of the Jewish people going back to Abraham.  It shows that Jesus, the Son of God, is truly, man, the New Adam, son of a woman, the New Eve.  In 1960, January 1 was simply part of the Octave of the Nativity.  But in 1969, with the revision of the Roman calendar, January 1 became the Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God.

So why all the changes and why is the feast about Mary and not Jesus?  Well, the feast IS about Jesus.  It is still the Octave of Christmas.  We celebrate Mary because she is the Mother of God!  In the fifth century a heresy was proposed that Mary was the mother of Jesus, and was the mother of the Messiah,  but NOT that she was the mother of God.  The reasoning of the heresy, Nestorianism, was that Mary could not be the mother of the God who created her.  In other words, the logic of human procreation was applied to the Incarnation of Jesus, which was NOT human procreation!  That is NOT the faith of the Church!

The Church taught that since Jesus IS truly God, the Son of God and IS truly man, the son of Mary; then Mary, his mother, IS truly the Mother of God!  The word used in Greek is Theotokos, or "God-bearer".  So, we celebrate January 1, the eighth day of the Octave of Christmas, the day on which Jesus was circumcised into the Jewish covenant, as the day of the maternity of Mary, who was the Ark of the New Covenant, the MOTHER OF GOD, JESUS!

* https://pxhere.com/en/photo/1174875  

December 25--The Nativity of Our Lord

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Critics of Christianity sometimes like to point out that Jesus wasn’t born on December 25, or Christmas was instituted by the Emperor Constantine, or the Christians were just using a pagan holiday called Saturnalia to lure pagans into worshiping Christ. Given that the Jewish concept of birthdays was not we have, there are reasons to think it is reasonable to use December 25. The feast of the Annunciation is March 25, which is nine months before Christmas and also held by the ancient Church as the date of Jesus’ Crucifixion and Resurrection. The first recorded Christmas celebration was in AD 336, during the reign of Constantine. And even though Saturnalia was not the basis of Christmas, Christians did take pagan holidays and Christianize them to help convert the people through their culture.

But all that, interesting as it may be, is not the point. The point is that God became man. The incarnation began at the Annunciation, but the birth of Jesus is the birth of the new era of reconciliation between God and humanity. To quote John: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth” (Jn 1:1, 14). We are the recipients of the greatest gift ever given, Jesus Christ, who, through his Paschal Mystery brought about our salvation. What can we do to respond to such a great gift? We can say thank you. We can give others the gift of our love. We can praise God with joy and offer mercy and grace to our neighbors. We can say “Merry Christmas”!

*https://pixy.org/529082/