Message of Abbot Paul - Christmas Day - Monday 25th December 2023

The Christmas story we know so well is Luke’s account of the birth of Jesus. Perhaps we take it for granted and Luke writes so beautifully that it makes for easy reading, even if what he writes is hard to grasp and difficult to understand. Take, for example, the sentence, “She wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger because there was no room for them in the inn.” These words are repeated by the angels to the shepherds as the sign that the newborn child is the Messiah, the cause of “great joy.”

What are swaddling clothes? In Israel at the time, when a child was born, the umbilical cord was cut and tied, then the baby washed, rubbed with salt and oil, and wrapped with strips of cloth. These strips kept the newborn child warm and also ensured that its limbs would grow straight. Mary must have done that for her newborn son. Did she do it alone or were there other women present, women who witnessed the birth of Jesus, just as later they would witness his death and resurrection? Perhaps they were the same women, who prepared Jesus for burial, dressing him in a funeral shroud. It’s strange that no women are mentioned except Mary and that we never see another woman at the crib. What the story does show us is how brave Mary was and how complete her trust in God. When she said to the angel, “Be it done unto me according to thy word,” she accepted her part in the Mystery of the Incarnation with all its terrible consequences. We can ask ourselves, what are we willing to do for God? How can we follow Mary’s example?

The child was “laid in a manger,” a feeding trough for cattle, found in every stable. No doubt it was convenient, comfortable and warm, what with the hay and the swaddling clothes, but there’s more to it than that. Mangers were made of wood, as was the cross on which Jesus was laid at his crucifixion. Mangers were shaped like an open coffin, reminding us of the tomb in which he lay dead as he awaited his resurrection. Cattle gather round a manger to feed, just as we gather round the altar for Jesus to feed us with his Body and Blood. We’re accustomed to seeing paintings and statues of the Madonna and Child with Mary looking lovingly at the babe in her arms, but in the stable at Bethlehem, the House of Bread, the Holy Infant lies alone in the manger wrapped in swaddling bands. We can ask ourselves, if God became incarnate, that we might eat the Bread of Life and so share in his life, what sacrifice are we willing to make so that Christ might live in us and we in him? 

“There was no room for them in the inn.” The shortest of phrases explains why Mary and Joseph ended up in a stable. The town was crowded for the census, but, in any case, no woman was allowed to give birth where others lived. Labour and childbearing had to take place in seclusion somewhere else. But there’s more to it than that. Jesus came as an outsider, a stranger, the God who lives as a man among men: his home was in heaven. John writes, “He came to his own home, and his own people did not accept him.” He came to be rejected, to face trial and humiliation and to die on a cross. Rejection began even before he was born, hence the stable. But what if Mary and Joseph had come to my door? What if they turn up today? Will I let them in? Will I make them welcome? Or will I turn them away? How often have I turned my back on Jesus and how often, even now, do I turn him away, when he comes to me and asks for my help in the person of the poor and the homeless, those made outcast and despised by others, immigrants and foreigners, and those who are just different from the rest of us? Is there still no room in the inn, even today? 

 On behalf of the Monastic Community, I wish you and all your loved ones a very Happy Christmas.