Monsignor Joe Stack St Patrick’s Catholic Church
God’s Blessings and Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year to all people of good will.
Christmas is the one holiday that so uniquely offers a brief moment of hope that peace and human goodness can and eventually will conquer our wars and divisions. This year, this hope seems ever more fragile and tenuous as hostilities break out all over the land of Jesus’ birth. If there’s joy in giving gifts that are sometimes frivolous, how much more can there be peace in giving something that will restore the humanity of those who suffer.
The reality of the Christmas message is that Jesus comes forth from the bosom of the Trinity to take on our flesh and all the complexities of human life, right up to the point of dying on a cross to save humanity.
This is the meaning of the Christmas that we celebrate in our Churches. We do not expect thatGod will wave a magic wand to bring about the much-longed for peace. But let’s do as the leaders of the Christian churches in the Holy Land ask: hold in our thoughts and prayers our brothers and sisters affected by this war and its consequences, and offer fervent prayers for just and lasting peace for our beloved Holy Land. – Monsignor Joe Stack.
