The Christmas mystery, the Christmas miracle, continues to lift up and celebrate all the things that surrounded the birth of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, especially in our feast days and readings.
Of the many characters that figure prominently in the biblical story of the birth of Jesus Christ in St. Luke’s Gospel are “shepherds.” In his third volume, “Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives,” Our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI writes, “Jesus was born among shepherds. He is the great Shepherd of mankind (p. 73). St. Luke tells us:
And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night (Luke 2:8).
It happened, when the angels went away from them into the sky, that the shepherds said one to another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem, now, and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us (Luke 2:15).”
The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, just as it was told them (Luke 2: 20).
And in tonight’s Gospel:
The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known the message that had been told them about this child. All who heard it were amazed
by what had been told them by the shepherds (Luke 2:16-18).
The imagery and presence of shepherds should come as no surprise, really. After all, Scriptures tell us, a shepherd knows his sheep and they know him (John 10:14), he gathers and leads them, feeding them (Isaiah 40: 11), they hear his voice and follow him (John 10:27). Jesus, the Good Shepherd, came for the same purposes, especially since we whom the Messiah came to save, from the time and sin of Adam and Eve, “have gone our own way (Isaiah 53: 6)” rather than following the path God intended.
We can say, in a sense, that Jesus was born to be the Good Shepherd and their presence on the hillsides in Bethlehem prefigured a task that Jesus himself would take up. They belonged there. And so, it was not simply a sentimental, “nice” part of the story. It was intentional. The shepherds were among the first people on earth to preach the Gospel, the Good News leading to Jesus Christ. But we cannot even think of Christmas and of Our Lord, we cannot even speak of the shepherds leading us to him, without recognizing the fact that they also lead us to Mary, his Mother, whose role at Christmas was essential, second to none.
Our second reading today from the Letter of St. Paul to the Galatians proclaims, “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to ransom those under the law, so that we might receive adoption” as God’s children. The phrase “the fullness of time” is referring to the right time for an event to occur, often in the light of some prophecy or prediction. Time is never really “full” but the concept means that when God decides something, it will happen. In our second reading, St. Paul relates this idea of “fullness of time” to Jesus Christ whose incarnation as the Messiah was previously foretold by the prophets. Mary was in the right time, the right place. She is central to our faith in the Word made Flesh as God’s own Mother. It was St. Anselm who wrote in the 11th century: “Without God’s Son, nothing exists; without Mary’s Son, nothing can be redeemed.” She is the intersection between God and man, between divinity and our humanity. And in the incarnation, God becomes inseparable from us forever through Jesus, Son of Mary.
And, so, in this New Year’s celebration, the Church honors Mary and places her before our minds and hearts as “the Mother of God.” So important is this role she played, that the Church makes this day a “holy day of obligation” for us.
St. Luke tells us that after Christ’s birth, “Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart.” And so do we, which is why year after year, century after century, millennium after millennium, we, too, repeat all these things of Christmas and reflect upon them in our hearts and within our families.
My sisters and brothers in Christ, this night we begin our celebration of the New Year, a time when we “ring out the old and ring in the new.” But, as St. Augustine writes in his Confessions, our faith in the Lord Jesus and our love for his Mother, is a “beauty ever ancient, ever new.”
New Year’s Eve is traditionally a time when we make resolutions: lose weight, stop smoking, drink less, save more money … a host of plans for the year ahead. As your bishop, let me suggest a more spiritual resolution to you. As Jesus came to live among us, we should resolve to live with him in our lives. As Mary, his Mother, reflected upon all that had occurred at that first Christmas, we should also reflect and keep these things in our hearts but, more importantly, show them in and by our lives. “God so loved the world,” St. John writes, “that he gave his only begotten Son.” Let us resolve to be grateful for this gift simply by being a little humbler, a little simpler, a little kinder – by doing our part to make our families, our neighborhoods and communities, yes, our world a better place. It’s not that difficult a resolution to keep.
With the shepherds, then, “Let us go to Bethlehem, now, and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” And, once we behold it, once we experience Christmas anew,it is ours to return in the New Year, “glorifying and praising God” for all the things that we have heard and seen, just as it was told us.
Happy New Year!