The Sacred Earthiness of Christmas
by George WeigelThe earthiness of Christmas proclaims and celebrates an enfleshed, divine savior, once an infant, who ennobles and transforms all the givens of the human condition. Continue Reading »
Rejoice in the Lord Always
by Gerald E. MurrayGaudete Sunday reminds us that the Lord is not far away, and his grace already fills us with a share in the eternal joy we so eagerly seek. Continue Reading »
Nolde’s “Heilige Nacht” (1912)
by Elisabeth MurawskiMary’s long white armslift the baby high above her head.He is seated in her palms, a pose precarious—his head droops, an eerie portent of the cross. Through the open doorway shepherds mosey closer with their crooks. The mule slobbers grain from the trough. Blue shadows ring Joseph’s eyes. . . . . Continue Reading »
Christmas, Freedom, and Obedience
by George WeigelTrue freedom, genuine liberation, comes through freely chosen obedience to God’s purposes. Continue Reading »
The Lowliness of Human Flesh
by Eric BaneckerMay we all ask for the grace to accept the humility of God and his choice to make room for us—lowly as we are—in his plan of salvation. Continue Reading »
Joseph
by Mary-Patrice WoehlingHe scrubbed the trough and filled it with fresh hay.The midnight sky was bright and hard and raw; The constellations danced above cold clay. That night the heavens put on a displayThat froze wise man and shepherd mute with awe.He scrubbed the trough and filled it with fresh hay And wondered how long . . . . Continue Reading »
On the Incarnation
by J. Augustine Di Noia, O.P.The following is a homily that was given at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C.: Dear friends in Christ, a warm welcome to all who join the Dominican friars on this Christmas morning to rejoice in the “marvelous exchange—O admirabile commercium—[by which] man’s Creator has . . . . Continue Reading »
The Last Scapegoat
by Matthew MillinerThe following is a sermon given last Sunday at All Souls Church (Wheaton, IL) in the wake of another Wheaton media controversy.
Christmas and a World Upside-Down
by George WeigelBiblical scholars generally agree that Luke’s Gospel was written at least a generation later than Paul’s first letter to the Christians at Corinth. Yet whatever the dating, and irrespective of scholarly disputes about whether “Luke,” the author of the eponymous Gospel and the Acts of the . . . . Continue Reading »
The Nativity of Our Lord
by Russell E. SaltzmanHe was born into the silence of this world. Because there was no room for him in a proper house the night he was born, the Gospel of Luke reports, he was born of his mother with Joseph nearby out there in the stable with the animals. Probably there was no one interested. That was the silence of that night. Who would care, anyway? Just one more peasant child, and who celebrates or notices or marks the birth of yet another peasant arriving in this world? Have you ever heard a prayer of thanks for the children born in a United Nations refugee camp? The children of peasants are always born into silence. Continue Reading »
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