In this conflict undertaken for us, a war has been waged on the mighty and highest principles of justice. The almighty Lord has gone into battle against our cruel enemy clothed not in his own majesty, but in our weakness. In Christ majesty has taken on humility, strength has taken on weakness, eternity has taken on mortality, and all in order to settle the debt we owe for our condition.
That is why at the birth of our Lord the angels sang for joy: ‘Glory to God in the highest,’ and proclaimed the message ‘peace to his people on earth’. For they see the heavenly Jerusalem being constructed out of all the nations of the world. How greatly then should we mere mortals rejoice when the angels on high are so exultant at this mysterious undertaking of divine love!
Let us, then, dearly beloved, give thanks to God the Father, through his Son, in the Holy Spirit, because in his great love for us he has taken pity on us, ‘and when we were dead in our sins he brought us to life with Christ,’ so that in him we might be a new creation, a new work of his hands. Let us throw off our old nature and all its habits and, as we have come to birth in Christ, let us renounce the works of the flesh.
Christian, acknowledge your own dignity; and now that you share in God’s own nature, do not return by sin to your former base condition. Bear in mind who is your head and of whose body you are a member. Remember that ‘you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God’s kingdom.’ Through the sacrament of baptism you have become a temple of the Holy Spirit. Do not drive away so great a guest by evil conduct and become again a slave to the devil, for your liberty was bought at the price of Christ’s blood.
alternative reading
A Reading from a poem by Robert Southwell
The Nativity of Christ
Behold the father is his daughter’s son,
The bird that built the nest is hatched therein,
The old of years an hour hath not outrun,
Eternal life to live doth now begin,
The Word is dumb, the mirth of heaven doth weep,
Might feeble is, and force doth faintly creep.
O dying souls, behold your living spring;
O dazzled eyes, behold your sun of grace;
Dull ears, attend what word this Word doth bring;
Up, heavy hearts, with joy your joy embrace.
From death, from dark, from deafness, from despairs,
This life, this light, this Word, this joy repairs.
Gift better than himself God doth not know;
Gift better than his God no man can see.
This gift doth here the giver given bestow;
Gift to this gift let each receiver be.
God is my gift, himself he freely gave me;
God’s gift am I, and none but God shall have me.
Man altered was by sin from man to beast;
Beast’s food is hay, hay is all mortal flesh.
Now God is flesh and lies in manger pressed
As hay, the brutest sinner to refresh.
O happy field wherein this fodder grew,
Whose taste doth us from beasts to men renew.
26 December
A Reading from a treatise On the Trinity by Hilary of Poitiers
How can we make a fitting recompense to God for stooping down to us so graciously? The one only-begotten God, born of God in a way that cannot be described, is enclosed in the shape of a tiny human embryo in the womb of the Virgin and grows in size. He who upholds the universe, in whom and through whom everything came into existence, is brought forth according to the law of human birth; he at whose voice the angels and archangels tremble, and the heavens, the earth and all the elements of the world melt, is heard in the cries of a baby. He who is invisible and incomprehensible, who cannot be judged by the reckonings of sight, sense and touch, lies wrapped in a cradle. If any consider these conditions unfitting for a God, they will have to admit that their indebtedness to such generosity is all the greater, the less they are suited to the majesty of God.
God, through whom humanity came into being, was under no compulsion to become human himself. However, it was necessary for humanity that he should be made flesh and dwell among us. He made our flesh his home by assuming our body of flesh. We have been raised up because he has stooped down to us: his abasement is our glory. He, being God, made our flesh his residence, that we in turn might be restored to God.
27 December
A Reading from a Hymn on the Nativity by Ephrem of Syria
Your mother is a cause for wonder: the Lord entered her
and became a servant; he who is the Word entered
and became silent within her; thunder entered her
and made no sound; there entered the Shepherd of all,
and in her he became the Lamb, bleating as he came forth.
Your mother’s womb has reversed the roles:
the Establisher of all entered in his richness,
but came forth poor; the Exalted One entered her,
but came forth meek; the Splendrous One entered her,
but came forth having put on a lowly hue.
The Mighty One entered, and put on insecurity
from her womb; the Provisioner of all entered
and experienced hunger; he who gives drink to all entered
and experienced thirst: naked and stripped
there came forth from her he who clothes all.
28 December
A Reading from a sermon of Mark Frank
Christ comes as soon to the low cottage as to the loftiest palace, to the handmaid as to the mistress, to the poor as to the rich; nay, prefers them here, honours a poor humble maid above all the gallant ladies of the world. You will see his humility most if you consider his wrapping up. He that measures the heavens with his span, the waters in the hollow of his hand, who involves all things, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, in whom all our beings and well-beings are wrapped from all eternity; comes now to be wrapped and made up like a new-born child – who can unwind or unfold his humility?
The clothes his dear mother wrapped him in are the very badges of humility; a rag, or torn and tattered clothes: such were the clothes she wrapped him in – such, he
