Friday, 25 December 2009

The Nativity of the Lord (Christmas), Mass during the Day – Solemnity

Today: Nativity of the Lord (Christmas), solemnity
Today the Church celebrates : Birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ

See commentary below or click here
Saint Leo the Great : “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us”

Book of Isaiah 52:7-10.

How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings glad tidings, Announcing peace, bearing good news, announcing salvation, and saying to Zion, “Your God is King!” Hark! Your watchmen raise a cry, together they shout for joy, For they see directly, before their eyes, the LORD restoring Zion. Break out together in song, O ruins of Jerusalem! For the LORD comforts his people, he redeems Jerusalem. The LORD has bared his holy arm in the sight of all the nations; All the ends of the earth will behold the salvation of our God.

Psalms 98:1.2-3.4.5-6.

Sing a new song to the LORD, who has done marvelous deeds, Whose right hand and holy arm have won the victory.
The LORD has made his victory known; has revealed his triumph for the nations to see,
Has remembered faithful love toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the victory of our God.
Shout with joy to the LORD, all the earth; break into song; sing praise.
Sing praise to the LORD with the harp, with the harp and melodious song.
With trumpets and the sound of the horn shout with joy to the King, the LORD.

Letter to the Hebrews 1:1-6.

In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he spoke to us through a son, whom he made heir of all things and through whom he created the universe, who is the refulgence of his glory, the very imprint of his being, and who sustains all things by his mighty word. When he had accomplished purification from sins, he took his seat at the right hand of the Majesty on high, as far superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs. For to which of the angels did God ever say: “You are my son; this day I have begotten you”? Or again: “I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me”? And again, when he leads the first-born into the world, he says: “Let all the angels of God worship him.”

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 1:1-18.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. A man named John was sent from God. He came for testimony, to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to testify to the light. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world came to be through him, but the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, but his own people did not accept him. But to those who did accept him he gave power to become children of God, to those who believe in his name, who were born not by natural generation nor by human choice nor by a man’s decision but of God. And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth. John testified to him and cried out, saying, “This was he of whom I said, ‘The one who is coming after me ranks ahead of me because he existed before me.'” From his fullness we have all received, grace in place of grace, because while the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father’s side, has revealed him.

Copyright © Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, USCCB

Commentary of the day :

Saint Leo the Great (?-c.461), Pope and Doctor of the Church
1st. sermon for the Nativity of the Lord; PL 59,190 (cf SC 22 bis, p. 67f., breviary)

“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us”

This is the day our Saviour was born: what a joy for us, my beloved! This is no season for sadness, this, the birthday of Life-the Life which annihilates the fear of death, and engenders joy, promising, as it does, immortality. Nobody is an outsider to this happiness. The same cause for joy is common to all, for our Lord… came with redemption for all. Let the saint rejoice, for he hastens to his crown; let the sinner be filled with joy, for pardon is offered him; let the Gentile be emboldened, for he is called to life. When the designated time had come, which God in his deep and impenetrable plan had fixed upon, God’s Son took the nature of man upon himself in order to reconcile man to his Creator…

The Word, God’s Speech, who is God, the Son of God «who was in the beginning with God; through whom all things came to be, and without whom nothing came to be», has become man to deliver man from eternal death. He humbled himself to assume our mortal condition yet without diminution to his greatness. Remaining what he was and assuming what he was not, he united our condition of a slave to his condition of equality with God the Father… Greatness was clothed with humility, strength with weakness, eternity with mortality: true God and true man, in the unity of a single Lord, «the one mediator between God and the human race» (1Tm 2,5)…

My beloved, let us offer thanksgiving to God the Father, through his Son, in the Holy Spirit. In the great mercy with which he loved us, he had pity on us, and «in giving life to Christ, gave life to us too, when we were dead through sin,» so that in him we might be a new creation, a new work of his hands (Ep 2,4-5; 2Co 5,17)… O Christian, be aware of your nobility!