On the last day of the year we hear the Gospel of St John: “In the beginning was the Word: the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things came to be, not one thing had its being but through him. All that came to be had life in him and that life was the light of men, a light that shines in the dark, a light that darkness could not overpower.” Although those words may not be the easiest to contemplate but they give us a great hope that even if the time passes quickly and we don’t have a time vehicle to go to the past to fix up the mistakes and sins we committed, we can still move forward without the burden of what we regret for, for what we did or for what we didn’t do.
The Year of Mercy which takes its full swing right now gives us that hope that unfinished businesses of the past have been taken into the hands of the One who was in the beginning of all we hoped for, desired, dreamed, planned etc. What we haven’t finished off, maybe because of our limitations, weakness, laziness, fear, lack of faith in God and people, etc. is still the material God works on for our bright future. The brightness of our future comes from the light which shone when the Son of God was born. As we read in the Book of Genesis one of the first things God created was light so that life could happen on earth. As humans we are not simply physical in need of the light of the Sun but we are also spiritual in need of the light of God. That light brightened the sky above Bethlehem and that light of Christ brightness every moment of our life and death so that in all those moments, despite their darkness, we can hope that life can come from them, that something good can come from them because God is the Beginning and the End of all we are and do. He is Alpha and Omega.
Embrace your past with trust in God’s mercy and look forward to 2016 trusting God’s grace to work in you.

Usually before Christmas we talk about brining Jesus back to Christmas. This year, however, I came across another campaign: Bring Joseph back to the Christmas postcards. There was also a cartoon attached showing someone taking a picture of Mary and Jesus while St Joseph in the distance was jumping up and down and saying: “What about me?”
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers!
            Even if many Christmas postcards make no mention of Bethlehem story, even if many Christian postcards miss Joseph, the Gospels about Jesus’ childhood don’t miss St Joseph. He appears in the snapshots of those passages, not because he wants to get attention but because the Gospels want to tell us that God the Father gave his only begotten Son not simply to the sinless virgin but God the Father gave his only begotten Son to a married couple, to a woman and a man who loving each other had already created an environment for Jesus.
            The Gospel for this Sunday of the Holy Family gives us another snapshot of the full Holy Family. Although the passage focuses on Jesus getting lost and later being found let me explore something else. St Luke says that: “Every year the parents of Jesus went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. When Jesus was 12 they did it as usual.”  I think that most of us could easily imagine those people walking up and down the valleys and hills of the Holy Land heading to the Holy City. To advance our imagination, however, let’s add this detail: The trip was done in small separate groups which consisted only women and only men. The meeting point at the end of the journey was the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem where the great festivities of Passover were being celebrated. In this way the joy of husbands being reunited with their wives and the joy of the wives being reunited with their husbands contributed to the joy of the festivities in the Holy City.
            Those people of Israel after centuries listening to the Word of God, reflecting on the Word of God and praying the Word of God revealed to them by prophets and other holy men and women had come to realise that the marriage, this loving and committed relationship between man and woman, is far greater that any mansion could contain. The influence of the marriage reaches beyond the walls of their family home and strengthens the wider society as well.
            When our Blessed Lord during the Last Supper prayed for his disciples he prayed so that they could be one, so that they could be united after the example and the mystery of the Blessed Trinity. That’s why he gave the Church some means to bring this unity about. One means is the sacrament of the Holy Orders the other means is the Sacrament of Matrimony. The Church teaches us that the two sacraments are the sacraments at the service of unity. They support the Church to treasure and strive for unity.
            This Sunday I would also like to say a profound thank you to the married couples, particularly present in this church. As it is impossible to imagine the Holy Family without Joseph as it is impossible to imagine the Church being united without your commitment to each other as husband and wife, without your matrimonial love which is far greater, even for the biggest mansion to contain. May Jesus who was at the centre of the marriage of Mary and Joseph be at the centre of your marriage and family.

A number of times I have been enquired whether my sermons are spontaneous. What I always answer is: “Yes they are, because I believe that the best spontaneity is well prepared.”
            I am convinced that most of you here, beginning to celebrate Christmas 2015 didn’t wait until this very day doing nothing and thinking: “Christmas’ festivities will work out somehow. I will be spontaneous this year with Christmas dinner and presents.” On the contrary I am convinced that what is happening in this church and what will continue in your homes has been a long, probably tiring, process of planning and preparing. You went through this process of planning and preparing because you care about your family and you want them to have a good Christmas, because you respect your victors and you want them to have a good Christmas, because you are responsible for what can do so that you contribute your best to the others having a good Christmas.
My Dear Sisters and Brothers gathered on this sacred day of Our Blessed Lord’s Nativity. In the history of the humankind there have been people who claimed being someone special, like Muhammad, Buddha, and Confucius, just to mention a few. However what stands Jesus Christ out from those people is that Jesus claimed to be God, not just a messenger of God. One could say: “It is not very humble of Jesus.” I would say to such a person: Investigate the circumstances of his birth: born in a place for animals, placed in the box from which the animals fed, ignored by the majority of the then social establishment. Do you still need more evidence to acknowledge that Jesus was humble? He didn’t need a spectacular entry to show his divine because he came into our midst not to prove his divinity but to save us through his divinity incarnated.
In 1814 when a brother of Louis XVI, the French King who was executed by the revolutionaries, returned to France people said to him: “Sir you are king now.” In return Louis asked them: “Have I been someone else before?”
Today as we turn our minds and hearts to this babe in the manger, which can confuse our imagination regarding the grandeur of Divine, we hear the angel evangelising us: “Do not be afraid. Listen, I bring you news of great joy, a joy to be shared by the whole people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born; he is Christ the Lord.” Christmas is not the beginning of Jesus as God because his divinity doesn’t have a beginning. He exists always in the mystery of the Most Blessed Trinity. Christmas doesn’t even begin Jesus’ story as a human person because his human story began nine month earlier when he was conceived upon Gabriel announcing to the Virgin Mary that she would be the Mother of God’s only begotten Son. So what is happening today? Today the Son of God is revealed to those we have been searching for God. He is revealed by heaven and earth so that those who have been searching for him could find him.
I have already mentioned that what stands Jesus out from the crowd of some special people is that he claims to be God. However there is something else what stands Jesus out. No one expected Muhammad to be born, no one expected Buddha to be born, and no one expected Confucius to be born. Jesus’ case is different. For millennia he was longed for. For millennia his coming for awaited. Although Christmas these days is full of surprises, particularly when it comes to gifts, the coming of Christ was not a surprise at all. Some Scripture scholars have counted that at the time of Jesus’ birth there were 456 prophesies regarding the coming of the Messiah, prophesies like the place of his birth, his mother, his tribe, his forerunner. Now let give a voice to mathematicians: If one of those prophesies were to be fulfilled by accident the chance was one in a hundred. If two prophesies were to be fulfilled the chance was one in a thousand. If three, one in ten thousand. If four, one in a hundred thousand. If five, one in a million. So now, what was a chance for all those 456 prophesies to be fulfilled in Christ? When you go home you can do this exercise at the end of your Christmas lunch: take a piece of paper and write 1/84 and then write 126 zeros. This is the chance of all the prophecies of Christ being fulfilled. It runs into millions and millions, trillions and trillions. However we are not talking maths today but we are talking our Salvation which was well prepared by the Blessed Trinity. The first Christmas wasn’t an extraordinary chance or a spontaneous event because God loves us, cares about us and respects us too much to leave our Salvation to spontaneity. Jesus Christ’s coming in flesh was well prepared, our Salvation was well prepare, and over centuries some hints, those messianic prophesies were gradually being revealed. When Christ appeared he didn’t say: “Surprise I am here!” instead he said: “As the prophets foretold. As you read in the Scriptures.”
God bless you this Christmas day and always.

As the day of our salvation nears we pause on this day of December 24 to reflect upon the journey we have made over the last week when we prayed the Great Advent Antiphons. Starting with the yesterday Great Advent antiphon and going backwards we will have them in Latin in the following order:

Emmanuel
Rex
Oriens
Clavis
Radix
Adonai
Sapientia
 
Let us conclude this spiritual exercise with the prayer of the Mass of December 24:
 
Come quickly, we pray, Lord Jesus,
and do not delay, that those who trust in your compassion
may find solace and relief in your coming.
who live and reign with God the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
 
 
As our longing for the Saviour intensifies the Lord himself gives us his response to that desire to see the Redeemer which was expressed in those Great Advent Antiphons. The first letters of those seven titles given to the Messiah by the Prophet Isaiah, and which we prayed over the last week, make a Latin sentence: ERO CRAS which means: “Tomorrow I will be there.” It is a profound assurance coming in this hectic time of preparations for the feasts. May this assurance resonate in our minds and hearts. The Lord is not deaf to those who invoke him, particularly to those who desire to welcome him into their lives.
 
If you have some time today I would like to encourage you to take your Bible and once again retrace the journey we have just completed praying the Great Advent Antiphons. It could be your meditation leading you to Christmas.
 
O Sapientia (O Wisdom ) Is. 11:2-3; 28:29
O Adonai (O Adonai ) Is. 11:4-5; 33:22
O Radix Jesse (O root of Jesse) Is. 11:1, 10
O Clavis David (O key of David) Is. 9:6; 22:22
O Oriens (O Rising Sun) Is. 9:1
O Rex Gentium (O King o nations) Is. 2:4; 9:5
O Emmanuel (O God with us) Is. 7:14
 
Have a prayerful final day of Advent.

From December 17 every day until Christmas we pray an “O Antiphon” which focuses on a biblical title given to the Messiah by the Prophet Isaiah, whose book in the Scriptures is also called the Gospel of the Old Testament as it expresses the great longing for the Saviour to come: O Sapientia (O Wisdom), O Adonai (O Lord), O Radix Jesse (O Root of Jesse), O Clavis David (O Key of David), O Oriens (O Rising Sun), O Rex Gentium (O King of the Nations), and O Emmanuel.
 
Over next week leading up to Christmas I would like to encourage you to pray these deeply scriptural antiphons in order to contract form them the Isaiah’s great longing for the Savior to come into our lives.
 
 
December 23
 
Prayer:
 
 
Almighty ever-living God,
as we see how the Nativity of your Son
according to the flesh draws near,
we pray that to us your unworthy servants,
mercy may flow from your Word,
who chose to become flesh of the Virgin Mary
and establish among us his dwelling
Jesus Christ our Lord.
Who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit
One God forever and ever.
 
 
 
O Emmanuel, you are our King and judge, the One whom the peoples await and their Saviour. O come and save us, Lord, our God.
 
O Emmanuel, Rex et legifer noster, exspectatio gentium et Salvator earum: veni ad salvandum nos, Domine Deus noster.

From December 17 every day until Christmas we pray an “O Antiphon” which focuses on a biblical title given to the Messiah by the Prophet Isaiah, whose book in the Scriptures is also called the Gospel of the Old Testament as it expresses the great longing for the Saviour to come: O Sapientia (O Wisdom), O Adonai (O Lord), O Radix Jesse (O Root of Jesse), O Clavis David (O Key of David), O Oriens (O Rising Sun), O Rex Gentium (O King of the Nations), and O Emmanuel.
 
Over next week leading up to Christmas I would like to encourage you to pray these deeply scriptural antiphons in order to contract form them the Isaiah’s great longing for the Savior to come into our lives.
 
 
December 22
 
Prayer:
 
 
O God, who seeing the human race fallen into death,
willed to redeem it by the coming of your only Begotten Son,
grant we pray,
that those who confess his Incarnation with humble fervour
may merit his company as their Redeemer.
Who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit
One God forever and ever.
 
 
 
O King whom all the peoples desire, you are the cornerstone which makes all one.
O come and save man, whom you made from clay.
 
O Rex gentium, et desideratus earum, lapisque angularis, qui facis utraque unum: veni et salva hominem, quem de limo formasti.
it.

From December 17 every day until Christmas we pray an “O Antiphon” which focuses on a biblical title given to the Messiah by the Prophet Isaiah, whose book in the Scriptures is also called the Gospel of the Old Testament as it expresses the great longing for the Saviour to come: O Sapientia (O Wisdom), O Adonai (O Lord), O Radix Jesse (O Root of Jesse), O Clavis David (O Key of David), O Oriens (O Rising Sun), O Rex Gentium (O King of the Nations), and O Emmanuel.
 
Over next week leading up to Christmas I would like to encourage you to pray these deeply scriptural antiphons in order to contract form them the Isaiah’s great longing for the Savior to come into our lives.
 
 
December 21
 
Prayer:
 
Hear in kindness, O Lord,
the prayers of your people,
that those who rejoice
at the coming of your only begotten Son in our flesh
may, when at last he comes in glory,
gain the reward of eternal life.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son
who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit
One God forever and ever.
 
 
 
O Rising Sun, you are the splendour of eternal light and the sun of justice:
O come and enlighten those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.
 
 
O Oriens, splendor lucis æternæ, et sol iustitiæ: veni et illumina sedentes in tenebris et umbra mortis.

From December 17, every day until Christmas we pray an “O Antiphon” which focuses on a biblical title given to the Messiah by the Prophet Isaiah, whose book in the Scriptures is also called the Gospel of the Old Testament as it expresses the great longing for the Saviour to come: O Sapientia (O Wisdom), O Adonai (O Lord), O Radix Jesse (O Root of Jesse), O Clavis David (O Key of David), O Oriens (O Rising Sun), O Rex Gentium (O King of the Nations), and O Emmanuel.
 
Over next week leading up to Christmas I would like to encourage you to pray these deeply scriptural antiphons in order to contract from them the Isaiah’s great longing for the Savior to come into our lives.
 
 
December 20
 
Prayer:
 
 
O God, eternal majesty, whose ineffable Word
the Immaculate Virgin received through the message of and Angel
and so became the dwelling-place of divinity,
filled with the light of the Holy Spirit,
grant we pray, that by her example
we may in humility hold fast to your will.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son.
Who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit
One God forever and ever.
 
 
 
O Key of David and sceptre of Israel, what you open no one else can close again; what you close no one can open. O come to lead the captive from prison; free those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.
 
 
O Clavis David, et sceptrum domus Israel, qui aperis, et nemo claudit, claudis, et nemo aperit: veni et educ vinctum de domo carceris, sedentem in tenebris et umbra mortis.
it.

            In the eighteenth century there was a priest, St Joseph Tomasi who studied the Bible and he wanted to learn the biblical languages to help him in his research. He mastered Greek and then he went on to learn Hebrew. As he was very serious about the project he turned to the best person ever to be his teacher: a Jewish rabbi. The teacher was good and Fr Joseph had mastered the language perfectly. However it wasn’t the only outcome of the classes: the rabbi became a Catholic. The rabbi grew fascinated with Christianity because of the way Fr Joseph was speaking about Jesus Christ.
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers!
            Seventeen centuries earlier there was a similar situation which St Luke captured in the Gospel. A young girl whose name was Mary had a visit from the Archangel Gabriel who announced to her that she would become the mother of the Son of God. Mary didn’t simply resign herself to the will of God but she welcomed it with all her love, faith and hope. She was the first one to give her life to the person and the mission of Jesus Christ. What does it mean to give one’s life to the person and the mission of Christ? It means sharing Christ who is your life, who is your love, who is your hope and who is your faith with others. Our Lady in today’s Gospel becomes the first human missionary of Jesus. What she accomplishes is done because she is totally committed to the Word of God. She didn’t give a brilliant speech about Jesus but because she was so soaked with the Word of God, she was so full of God’s Word that even her normal greeting was like a spark sent right to Elizabeth, the spark that set Elizabeth on fire which was already burning in Mary, the fire of God’s love.
My Friends, please pay attention to how Elizabeth reacts. This woman who a few months earlier was thinking about dying after having lived a long life childless now is lovingly embracing the growing bump in her tummy: the baby she didn’t expect to have. However when Mary greets her, the happy old Elizabeth discovers a far bigger happiness - the Saviour who was longed for by generations of Jews is coming to her now. Elizabeth describes Mary as “the Mother of my Lord.”
            I realise that we are in Christmas mood right now but let fast forward thirty odd years. There is another scene in the Bible when someone meeting Jesus says: “My Lord and my God.” Do you know who the person was? St Thomas, to whom Christ came after the Resurrection and said: “Look, here are my hands. Give me your hand; put it into my side. Doubt no longer but believe.” Thomas became a believer like Elizabeth became a believer.
            That’s why, we Catholics, are so “crazy” about Mary because she is “crazy” about Jesus Christ. We keep turning to her to have a share in her love, faith and hope in Jesus Christ. Some friends of mine say that I am addicted to saying the Rosary. The truth is I am not addicted but I am realistic. My faith, hope and love for Jesus are not as strong as I would like it. That’s why I spend lots of time praying to Mary to get from her that spark which set Elizabeth on fire. I can also recommend to you, not just the Rosary, but all various prayers which bring us closer to Mary. Look what happened to Elizabeth at meeting the Mother of the Lord, our Lord.
            To finish let me give you homework. Don’t panic I am not expecting you to learn Hebrew like St Joseph Tomasi. The project I would like you to undertake is to reflect on how you word your Christmas wishes, whether they are traditional postcards or emails, phone messages, Facebook, Skype, etc. Do you think that those who get those wishes from you can tell, firstly that you are a disciple of Christ and secondly that Christ is important to you?

From December 17 every day until Christmas we pray an “O Antiphon” which focuses on a biblical title given to the Messiah by the Prophet Isaiah, whose book in the Scriptures is also called the Gospel of the Old Testament as it expresses the great longing for the Saviour to come: O Sapientia (O Wisdom), O Adonai (O Lord), O Radix Jesse (O Root of Jesse), O Clavis David (O Key of David), O Oriens (O Rising Sun), O Rex Gentium (O King of the Nations), and O Emmanuel.
 
Over next week leading up to Christmas I would like to encourage you to pray these deeply scriptural antiphons in order to contract form them the Isaiah’s great longing for the Savior to come into our lives.
 
 
December 19
 
Prayer:
 
 
O God who through the child-bearing of the Holy Virgin
graciously revealed the radiance of your glory to the world,
grant, we pray,
that we may venerate with integrity of faith
the mystery of so wondrous as Incarnation
and always celebrate it with due reverence.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son.
Who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit
One God forever and ever.
 
 
 
O Root of Jesse, you stand as a signal for the nations; kings fall silent before you whom the peoples acclaim. O come to deliver us, and do not delay.
 
 
O Radix Iesse, qui stas in signum populorum, super quem continebunt reges os suum, quem gentes deprecabuntur: veni ad liberandum nos, iam noli tardare.