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The Christmas Cycle
Scripture calls our adulteries. Christmas rescues us from these inordinate pleasures, from
covetousness, from our tepidity, from our unchecked sensuality and self-complacency, from
our eagerness for power and honor. Christ brings us relief from all the ills that trouble humanity.
He establishes us in the only soil in which we may expect spiritual growth, in the
hidden life with God.
In the modern world, almost anything may serve as a god. Money, sensual pleasure, beauty,
and athletics all have their worshipers. God appears to be the only thing that can be readily
dispensed with. God is a tiresome burden. At Christmas time He appears among us as a man
and offers us the truth. His own life furnishes us with a living example of the complete, true, and
happy way of life. He shows us the way, and the only way, out of the confusion that bewilders
the world today. He infuses into our souls a divine light and a divine strength. He pours oil and
wine into our wounds and is tireless in His efforts to help us. With His plan of redemption He
returns to us each year, just as He appeared on the first Christmas Day. “On earth peace to men
of good will.” Blessed be the coming of the Lord!
Acutely aware of the need of this godless and irreligious generation, and feeling the needs of the
race as well as those of our immediate friends and neighbors, we seek to serve as intercessors
and advocates for wretched humanity. “To Thee I have lifted up my soul” (Introit). We cry out
in our own name and in the name of all men for the coming of the Savior. “Show us, O Lord,
Thy mercy, and grant us Thy salvation” (Ps 84:8). “Stir up Thy might, we beseech Thee, O Lord,
and come.” Thou shalt save Thy people from their sins; Thou shalt heal their wounds.
In the Mass we lift up to the Father our pure, holy, and immaculate gift, the body and blood
of the Savior. In the name of all our brethren we ask mercy through the sufferings and death of
Jesus Christ. We ask God to forgive our sins and to “lead us not into temptation,” but to deliver
us from the evil of the neglect of God and His commandments. We ask Him to deliver us from
the evils of impenitence, spiritual blindness, and eternal damnation.
“To Thee I have lifted up my soul.” In praying thus, the Church teaches us that God will
deliver us from the threatening dangers of our sins, and that He will shield us and deliver us from
eternal damnation. Out of love He comes as our Redeemer and Savior. We believe in Him, we
trust in Him, we thank Him and prepare His way before Him.
Prayer
Stir up Thy might, we beseech Thee, O Lord, and come, that from the threatening dangers of
our sins we may be rescued by Thy protection and saved by Thy deliverance, who livest and
reignest world without end. Amen.
Thursday
“Lift up your heads, because your redemption is at hand” (Gospel). We live in expectation of the
Savior and of our coming redemption. The birth of Christ will bring us the assurance that God
“hath sent redemption to His people; He hath commanded His covenant forever” (Ps 110:9).
Crying out from the depths of our misery and spiritual need, we trust that the coming Savior
will bring us the needed help, “because with the Lord there is mercy, and with Him plentiful
redemption” (Ps 129:7).
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