WITH Christmas, we are somehow
reminded of that beautiful
and awesome truth that God loves us so much that in spite of our sins
and unworthiness, he continues to love us by adopting us as his
children and adapting himself to our condition so we can have a way to
be like him and to regard him as our Father.
Christmas is about God becoming man. He is the Son of God,
the second person of the Trinitarian God, the very pattern of our
creation. And yet he allows himself to be conceived in the virginal
womb of Mary, and is born in a manger in a remote corner in Bethlehem.
The creator makes himself a creature. The pattern fleshes up his own
pattern for our sake.
It’s because of this most wonderful truth that we
romanticize Christmas with all the creativity that we can muster, and
we, of course, are doing it rightly. Nothing wrong with that. But we
cannot deny the fact that Christmas involves what we can consider as
the painful process of God emptying himself to the extreme just to be
with us as intimately as possible.
Yes, what we consider as painful and negative on the
whole, becomes the very expression of love insofar as God is
concerned. He spares himself nothing just to be with us and to save
us, never to condemn us. His love is a kind of divine madness.
It’s because of this that we can call him the master of
adoption and adaptation. His love is such that he identifies himself
with us, assuming not only our nature but also the consequences of
sin, short of sin itself. He does this so we can also have a way of
identifying ourselves with God, whose image and likeness we are.
God is true and faithful to his word for us, even if we
abuse and corrupt that word. He is willing to undergo whatever
sacrifices are needed just to keep that fidelity intact. He adopts us
as his children, and he adapts himself to our condition, however it
may go, just to keep that divine filiation of ours a living reality.
We just have to try our best to correspond properly and
generously to this divine madness by repaying love with love also.
Christ himself commanded it of us: “You shall love one another as I
have loved you.”
To repay love with love, we have to follow his example of
being a master of adoption and adaptation. Like him, let us do our
best to identify ourselves with the others through the many ways of
love: empathy, sympathy, compassion, patience, affection, mercy, acts
of service, generosity, etc.
For all this to happen, we have to understand that we have
to be as demanding on ourselves as much as we can, because only then
can we be able to truly love the others as they ought to be loved,
allowing the grace of God to work on us effectively.
Let’s remember that love is determined by what the others
expect and demand from us, by what they truly need, and by what they
objectively deserve as defined by God’s designs for all of us upon
creating us.
And love does not hide in anonymity. It seeks to enter
into the lives of the loved ones. That’s why it is inventive, creative
and versatile. It knows how to adapt itself to the concrete conditions
of the beloved. It goes beyond simply knowing others. Loving others
involves uniting and identifying oneself with the beloved.
And so we have to be very tough. We just cannot be
confined and restrained by the conditions of our temperament,
character and the many transitory circumstances that define our life
in a given moment.
We need to empty ourselves more or less in the way Christ
emptied himself to become man and to die on the cross for our sake. We
have to be convinced that this self-emptying, while involving a lot of
suffering, is the sure path of our own perfection, our own maturity.
We should feel happy to experience the adventure of self-emptying.
Let’s strengthen our faith in the words of Christ who
said: “Whosoever exalts himself shall be humbled, and he that humbles
himself shall be exalted.” (Mt 23,12) Let’s glory in humility and
ceaselessly find ways of deepening this indispensable virtue of
humility.
We can do this in many ways—making many acts of service
while passing unnoticed, eager to help, even to volunteer without
being asked. We forgive and also ask for forgiveness, etc.
and awesome truth that God loves us so much that in spite of our sins
and unworthiness, he continues to love us by adopting us as his
children and adapting himself to our condition so we can have a way to
be like him and to regard him as our Father.
Christmas is about God becoming man. He is the Son of God,
the second person of the Trinitarian God, the very pattern of our
creation. And yet he allows himself to be conceived in the virginal
womb of Mary, and is born in a manger in a remote corner in Bethlehem.
The creator makes himself a creature. The pattern fleshes up his own
pattern for our sake.
It’s because of this most wonderful truth that we
romanticize Christmas with all the creativity that we can muster, and
we, of course, are doing it rightly. Nothing wrong with that. But we
cannot deny the fact that Christmas involves what we can consider as
the painful process of God emptying himself to the extreme just to be
with us as intimately as possible.
Yes, what we consider as painful and negative on the
whole, becomes the very expression of love insofar as God is
concerned. He spares himself nothing just to be with us and to save
us, never to condemn us. His love is a kind of divine madness.
It’s because of this that we can call him the master of
adoption and adaptation. His love is such that he identifies himself
with us, assuming not only our nature but also the consequences of
sin, short of sin itself. He does this so we can also have a way of
identifying ourselves with God, whose image and likeness we are.
God is true and faithful to his word for us, even if we
abuse and corrupt that word. He is willing to undergo whatever
sacrifices are needed just to keep that fidelity intact. He adopts us
as his children, and he adapts himself to our condition, however it
may go, just to keep that divine filiation of ours a living reality.
We just have to try our best to correspond properly and
generously to this divine madness by repaying love with love also.
Christ himself commanded it of us: “You shall love one another as I
have loved you.”
To repay love with love, we have to follow his example of
being a master of adoption and adaptation. Like him, let us do our
best to identify ourselves with the others through the many ways of
love: empathy, sympathy, compassion, patience, affection, mercy, acts
of service, generosity, etc.
For all this to happen, we have to understand that we have
to be as demanding on ourselves as much as we can, because only then
can we be able to truly love the others as they ought to be loved,
allowing the grace of God to work on us effectively.
Let’s remember that love is determined by what the others
expect and demand from us, by what they truly need, and by what they
objectively deserve as defined by God’s designs for all of us upon
creating us.
And love does not hide in anonymity. It seeks to enter
into the lives of the loved ones. That’s why it is inventive, creative
and versatile. It knows how to adapt itself to the concrete conditions
of the beloved. It goes beyond simply knowing others. Loving others
involves uniting and identifying oneself with the beloved.
And so we have to be very tough. We just cannot be
confined and restrained by the conditions of our temperament,
character and the many transitory circumstances that define our life
in a given moment.
We need to empty ourselves more or less in the way Christ
emptied himself to become man and to die on the cross for our sake. We
have to be convinced that this self-emptying, while involving a lot of
suffering, is the sure path of our own perfection, our own maturity.
We should feel happy to experience the adventure of self-emptying.
Let’s strengthen our faith in the words of Christ who
said: “Whosoever exalts himself shall be humbled, and he that humbles
himself shall be exalted.” (Mt 23,12) Let’s glory in humility and
ceaselessly find ways of deepening this indispensable virtue of
humility.
We can do this in many ways—making many acts of service
while passing unnoticed, eager to help, even to volunteer without
being asked. We forgive and also ask for forgiveness, etc.
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