Press Releases
The Archbishop of Dublin's Christmas Day sermon - Christ Church Cathedral
?When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us? Luke 2:15
The Christmas story takes place on two levels. On one level, heavenly messengers and choirs of angels appear, and on the other, an overcrowded inn and the birth of a baby in a stable set the scene. Part of the magic and mystery of Christmas that attracts those of all ages is that in some way at Christmas life is lifted away from the purely mundane.
For a brief time at least, we glimpse something of another dimension to life. At best hands are reached out to repair broken relationships, and even if Christmas ceasefires may be transitory, they do give a chance to pause and reflect.
Though we lament the appearance of Christmas decorations at Halloween, we are going to miss them when they are taken down! The other evening, I sat at red traffic lights a few hundred metres from this Cathedral, and my attention was drawn to magnificent displays on the balconies of a block of flats, and as a result I almost forgot to go when the lights turned green! Yes, unless you allow the ?Scrooge? syndrome to surface, Christmas really has something for us all!
What can come across as mere sentimentality, and even nostalgia surrounding Christmas, points to a deeper reality. Christmas is still in the midst of a secular world a real and valid sign of a deeper reality.
The reality that we affirm as Christians is that in the birth of Jesus, God entered this world in a new and dramatic manner ? removing the barrier between the divine and the human through the gift of his Son. He chose to identify with the ordinary, and not just with the ordinary at its most attractive. He chose to make the ordinary the place where we encounter his love and joy.
God is saying to us in the Christmas events ? ?I am right at the centre of your world, and I am not letting go. You do not put me here; I have come among you of my own free and sovereign will.?
Yes the symbolism of this great divine initiative is all about us, but the message does not always get through. Instead of the Christ of Bethlehem, the one who went on to show the power of God?s giving throughout his life, in his death and in his rising from the dead, men and women have looked elsewhere for life?s meaning. We have too easily glanced aside from that Divine Gift of Love to the materialism that seduces, the self interest that perverts and the escape routes that capture through addiction.
Today we are invited to respond to the message of the angels and join the shepherds on their journey. St Luke reminds us: ?When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us?
Bethlehem is not in the first instance about our search for God, it is about God coming to us in Jesus. The shepherds went in response to the divine invitation to behold the gift of God. The gift was revealed in a very real world ? a world of conflict, of isolation and of unrest. God?s gift was revealed in Bethlehem.
Bethlehem today as well as being the place of that divine revelation in Jesus is a lonely place now for the followers of the infant Lord. Palestinian Christians are caught in the middle throughout the Holy Land, whether in Israel or the Palestinian territories. To the Israeli, they are so easily associated with Arab extremism, whilst to their Palestinian neighbours, they are often seen to represent a western faith and certainly out of step with radical Islam. Today, let us remember them, and indeed all who live in places of fear and unrest in many parts of the world.
The very painful reality of Bethlehem where God?s gift was revealed represents for us the reality that this gift is to be found anywhere in God?s world. Nearer to home, as we celebrate this season of joy, our thoughts turn to those who have suffered through the criminal violence that is now becoming so commonplace in our own society. At the very edges of Irish society now are not only those who choose a way of life that isolates them, but also those unwittingly drawn into lives dominated by addictions that continually pull them further down.
Here in the city centre, we are aware of the homeless, and also those far from home and loved ones who have come to our shores seeking asylum, or simply an escape from poverty. There are no instant solutions to any of their problems, but we have to begin from the fact that these are each individuals made in the image of God, and for whom Jesus Christ came into the world.
As those who come to celebrate the Gift of God given in Bethlehem, God is surely saying to us that he is just as concerned with the world today as he was two thousand years ago. We who hear again the message of the angels and take it to heart have news to share, a life to offer.
In our worship now we join the shepherds on their journey to Bethlehem, as we hasten to the altar to receive Jesus, God?s gift to us. When God chose to become man in Jesus, he broke down barriers, but it is up to those who receive God?s gift to ensure that for others the reality of Bethlehem is there ? God?s love reaching into the darkness, to raise us all, whatever darkness we may be encountering to see that light which is Jesus Christ.
?When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us?
Further information from:Mr Garrett Casey,
Diocesan Communications Officer,
Dublin and Glendalough,
Tel: +353 1 6106447
Mob: + 353 87 2356472