Patriarch Fouad Twal’s Christmas homily is well worth savoring, a beautiful message of hope and salvation in the midst of rending conflicts and bloodshed. In the city of Bethlehem the simple story of the Nativity was retold with passion by a prince of the Church who loves his spiritual children. Here is a clip:
Zenit: Welcome to this divine Child! Welcome to the Christmas message and the joy of Christmas and the Christmas presents which bring back the smile to the faces of both the little and the big. This new Child is the fruit of the love of the Eternal Father for humankind, a love which desires for us more than we desire for ourselves. It wants a peace that we have lost, a loss to which we have resigned ourselves; mutual love which no longer exists to the point that it has disappeared even from our vocabulary; respect and dignity, so often battered by maltreatment, by insults and the spilling of blood.
Indeed, welcome to this Child who reminds us of our own childhood, sweetness and gentleness in a world that values hardness, having contempt for weakness and fear, taking pleasure in hatred and disrespect. Full sermon can be read here.
