OMELIE / Omelie EN

25 dic 2025

25/12/2025 - Holy Christmas of the Lord

25/12/2025 - Holy Christmas of the Lord

Midnight Mass Isaiah 9:1-3, 5-6 Psalm 95/96 Titus 2:11-14 Luke 2:1-14

Dawn Mass Isaiah 62:11-12 Psalm 96/97 Titus 3:4-7 Luke 2:15-20

Daytime Mass Isaiah 52:7-10 Psalm 97/98 Hebrews 1:1-6 John 1:1-18

Christmas is a bright day, but how can we speak on this day? There are many points for reflection, the biblical readings are beautiful and rich, and the general atmosphere is sweet and tender due to the presence of a Child. What can we say? Are there those who wish to listen, or does everyone eagerly await silence?

Today, the Word of God becomes concrete, visible, palpable. Our ears are not enough to receive it, our hands are not enough, our eyes are not enough, even our hearts are not enough. To receive this Word, and therefore to listen to God, we need all of this, our whole being, and even that is not enough. Words could therefore disturb us, take away space from the Word. If you have already begun your silence, forget these lines and continue your listening and contemplation!

The Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us: if I seek the Word, the Word of God, I do not have to go far, it is among us. It is here on earth that God manifests his desires and communicates his will and his consolations. I look around me and see human faces. What is God saying to me? He is saying: I am here with them and for them, to love them. Can't you see that human beings are simply people who need love? It is not only those who need a home, bread or clothing. Around you are those who have no one in their hearts: you can see it in their empty, cold gaze, in their search for noise or meaningless words, in their hands accustomed only to clutching a cigarette or a coffee cup, in their desire for movement and change. How much thirst and hunger there is around you! They are hungry and thirsty for Jesus: they do not know it, so today they use the word “Christmas” to delude themselves once again. Do not say “Christmas”, say “Christmas of Jesus” instead. It is he who must come alive on your lips and in your gaze, so that those who meet you today may meet someone who refers to him!

Take the Child from his Mother's arms: she willingly gives him to you. You are not worthy to hold him, we know, but the Mother gives him to you anyway. Look at that Child who does not intimidate you, who appreciates you despite your sinful condition, look at him as he asks nothing of you. Now it is easy for you to love him, because he asks nothing of you. If you give him something, a little attention, a little silence, it is because you still have a little goodness within you, a gift from God from the beginning. Love him, become attached to him, make a little effort for him now that he is a child. It will be easier for you to listen to him when he begins to speak, when he says things your ears are not accustomed to hearing.

Love him now, so that when he says, “blessed are the poor in spirit”, you will remember his manger, his mother's poverty and his father's serenity, who can give him nothing but poverty, poverty as food, poverty as toys and poverty as clothing. He will not be ashamed of the poverty in which he is welcomed: in that poverty he receives love and learns to love.

Love him now, bring him to your cheek to kiss him, so that you may continue to love him when he says, “Blessed are those who mourn”: then you will be able to carry your cross with serenity and courage.

Love him now, so that you will love him and take him seriously when he says, “Blessed are the pure in heart”: then you will be happy to control your impulses, not to follow your desires for affection, not to give in to the urge to be caressed by just anyone.

Love him now, while he is still a child, grow fond of him, so that you will listen to him when he says to you, “turn the other cheek”, and you will not feel that these words are foreign to you; you will listen to him when he says to you, “pray without ceasing”, and when he amazes everyone by saying, “invite the poor and the blind, the crippled and the lame, who have nothing to give you in return”! Take him in your arms now, so that you will not flee from him when you see him crowned with thorns and spat upon as he carries the cross.

Look kindly upon his Mother: her young face is illuminated by the light that comes from him, a light that must also shine from your eyes to give hope to the world. Let your darkness dissipate: pronounce his name, overcoming your modesty and your fear. It is the name of the Child who conquers that death which allows fears to close hearts so that they lose life and die. Pronounce his name with me: Jesus! Welcome, Jesus! Jesus, here I am!