Christmas soon strikes in a couple of hours.
It is very sad!
After getting in touch with close relatives in some parts of the country wishing them a meaningful birth of the Messiah, they worry about the food and other useless issues that have nothing to do with the essence of Christmas.
Many times in the years past and as recent as in a couple of days, I shared them my immutable position that material things have no value in celebrating the birth of the Savior.
I am saddened to hear their foolish reasons that despite the imbued spirituality the relatives and I deeply share, the commercialized version of Christmas has now more weight in them.
I am not surprised!
Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve whom Jesus rubbed elbows with instantly lost his faith. Peter, walking on the sea started to sink when storm inflated the waves and feared.
On the other side of the coin, it is not also surprising that a sinner can also be instantly converted.
Saul, after felled with a lighting bolt and hearing the voice of the unseen became a new person. Mary Magdalene, once a prostitute saw the light of salvation. One of the thieves at the last moment of his life repented and was instantly promised with a Paradise. The centurion’s heart watching Jesus in his last hours was melted from a conceited heart to a repenting heart.
But that is what freedom of religion is all about that I respect. One is free to worship in accordance with hi/her conscience. And it does not matter whether one is Catholic, Christian, Buddhist, Jew or Muslim.
As the clock strikes midnight the Son of God is born and becomes like us but without sin. He can be cuddled and loved and not feared as the master of the universe and our lives. May He forgive our indifference in putting less emphasis on the meaning of his incarnation that He comes to carry our sins embedded on his cross so that we may live.
Parties, fantastic and exotic foods, new attires, eye-catching decors, deafening noise of bamboo canons and weapons of death, firecrackers and what most have in our midst at the threshold of Christmas are the stuff Christ does not need.
I am with the street children or families living under the bridges missing a meal in tattered clothing welcoming Jesus, a poor like them. He is not only born in Nazareth but also in an empty but spiritually rich heart which to my mind, now very few. I am with the oppressed, the dehumanized, the persecuted, the weak, underprivileged and hopeless not only here in the Philippines but from anywhere whether they are Christians or not.
Christ sees our nothingness as we welcome Him.
And what is the end of the story?
Those are the kind of people whom Jesus loved and identified with while on earth.
Despite the sadness I have for the gradual shifting of piety to materialism if not atheism, Christ comes to forgive and as He said on the cross “Father forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.”
May He abundantly do. -30-
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