‘Family; What a wonderful Christmas gift!’

We are all aware that Jesus is God, but at Christmas, we encounter the God made man. Jesus comes to us as a real human being; he is a little child, so meek and humble. He is small and helpless; so much in need of all that love and care can give. A good question to ponder around this time of the Liturgical calendar is, "How ready are we to receive Him?" or, "How ready were we in the previous Christmases?" What is our readiness for the future anticipation of the same event? When the hour of the birth approached, Joseph and Mary asked for a simple dwelling place, but there was none in the vicinity. If this were to happen today, do you think you would have offered your house and all it holds?

Today, there is much trouble in the world, and I think that much of it begins at home, in our families. This is why this Christmas message is for families. The world is suffering not because there is no peace in the world, but because there is no peace in the family. Jesus is coming to us to restore that peace. There is peace in the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Why can’t this same peace exist in the family of Josh, Melanie, and Jason?

So many thousands of broken homes exist in our neighborhoods. Christ comes to us at this time so that we may make our homes centers of compassion and forgiveness and so bring peace.

Christ is coming to us so that we may make our houses, and our families another Nazareth, where love, peace, joy, and unity reign, for love begins at home. You must start there and make your home a center of love. All in the family must be the hope of eternal peace and happiness. Children to be the hope of peace and happiness to their parents and vise versa, also wives to be the hope of peace and happiness to their husbands and vise versa. This is to be extended even to the grandparents and to whoever is connected to you.

The home is where the mother is. In the early 1999, I was living in the City of Nairobi, Kenya as I was waiting for traveling documents to go to the seminary in Tanzania in August. During this time, I volunteered at Don Bosco Boys Town, a home and a center for the street children. One day, the priest who was the director of the home came with some new boys he found on the street. We gave them a bath, clean clothes, and food, but one ran away. He was found again by somebody else, but ran away a second time. At this time, the director told us -- the volunteers -- to follow the boy and see where he goes when he runs away.

When the boy ran the third time, we followed him, and there, between two story buildings, was the mother. She had put stones under a small earthenware vessel and was cooking some food she had found. We introduced ourselves to the mother who was very warm, and then we asked the boy, "Why did you run away from the home?" And the boy answered, "But this is my home because this is where my mother is."

The boy was correct, that was home. The little food that was found was better than what we could provide because the mother had cooked it. It was the mother who hugged the boy, Mother who wanted the boy – and the boy his mother. And between a wife and a husband, it is the same….

Let us pray that we shall be able to welcome Jesus this Christmas – not in the cold manger of our hearts but in a heart full of love for humanity, a heart warm with love for one another.