Christmas 2013 – Homily by Fr. Val Handwerker
Cathedral
Christmas. In Spanish it’s Navidad, meaning “Nativity.” In Italian, Natale,
meaning “Birth.” In English, though, it’s Christmas. “Christ+mas,” that is,
“Christ’s Mass.” Yes, that’s the origin of the word Christmas—“Christ’s Mass.”
It’s what we’re doing this very night as we begin our cherished Christmas
celebration—at “Christ’s Mass.”
For that first Christmas it’s intriguing whom God invited to be the first ones to see
the Infant Jesus lying in the manger, with his mother Mary and Joseph. Through
the angel God invited that first Christmas—shepherds. Back then, it was a
despised trade: shepherds were a mangy bunch, and because they were “living in
the fields,” they were bathless, ill kept. As a result, shepherds were ritually
unacceptable for public worship. They truly had the “smell of their sheep”: they
stunk, and they weren’t welcomed for worship. They didn’t belong. (1)
The shepherds, though, were those whom God invited at that first “Christ+Mass.”
Literally a month ago, Pope Francis came out with a major teaching entitled The
Joy of the Gospel. In this exhortation Pope Francis taught about the Mass, or
Eucharist, which we celebrate around this sacred table. Listen to what Pope
Francis teaches us: “The Eucharist…is not a prize for the perfect but a
powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak…The Church is not a
tollhouse; it is the house of the Father, where there is a place for everyone,
with all their problems.” (2)
Indeed, “a place for everyone, with all their problems.” Sisters and brothers:
perhaps that’s why God first invited grungy, scruffy shepherds to that first
“Christ+Mass” at the Bethlehem manger! Too often the Church seems to crack its
door open only for those who keep the rules. Especially this Christmas, let’s open
wide the doors! Let’s feast on the Eucharist, in which we have the same Body of
Christ as that Jesus who laid in the manger that first “Christ+Mass.” Yes, the Body
and Blood of Christ are “a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak!”
“O Come, all ye faithful.” Of course! This Christmas, however, Pope Francis
gives a high five to the angel as the angel proclaims to all the world: O Come, all
ye un-faithful, too!
You know, we never hear another thing in the Gospels about those shepherds who
first saw the infant Jesus that sacred night. I wonder what happened to them. I bet,
though, that about thirty years or so later, one of those shepherds might have been
late at night in the fields, and told a co-worker something like this: “I heard that
they crucified that Jesus, and reports are out that on the third day, he was raised
from the dead. I’m happy to hear about that. One night, long ago, an angel—yes,
no less than an angel!—invited a bunch of us shepherds to a stable, and we saw
that newborn Jesus. I really felt special that night: loved. That changed me.”
This is our Christ+Mass. May all of us meet Jesus tonight in a new way, he being
very close within us. May we truly experience that, in his eyes, we are indeed
special.
“Do not be afraid. For behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that
will be for all the people. For today…a savior has been born for you who is
Christ and Lord.” All of us here tonight: let’s allow Jesus to heal us, to nourish
us, and to transform us. He has invited us to this Christ+Mass and to feast on him!
(1) See F.W. Danker, Jesus and the New Age, pg. 27, quoted by Robert J.
Karris, O.F.M., in “The Gospel according to Luke,” in The New Jerome
Biblical Commentary, edited by Raymond E. Brown, S.S., Joseph A.
Fitzmyer, S.J., and Roland E. Murphy, O.Carm. (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice Hall, 1990), pg. 683.
(2) Pope Francis, The Joy of the Gospel (Evangelii Gaudium), Apostolic
Exhortation, November 24, 2013 (Washington, D.C.: United States
Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2013), #47.