Meditation on Christmas Eve: Waiting for Jesus.

It is Christmas Eve! We are traveling through the night toward dawn. Jesus is the sun that illuminates our existence. In this illumination, the Virgin Mother is our companion and guide. Her whole life is centered on her Son. So our whole life must also be centered on the Son. He is what gives meaning to our life; he is our center. The mother is the woman who kept all these things in her heart. The Virgin Mary meditates and reflects within herself, in her heart, on all this mystery that is taking place in her person.
She was preserved from the stain of original sin. In her, everything is beauty because of the unique presence of the Holy Trinity: the Father has asked her to be the mother of his Son, through the sanctifying action of the Holy Spirit.
The Virgin Mother is a woman of faith and prayer. Through prayer, she enters into and remains in constant communication with her Son whom she carries in her womb. That is prayer: talking with God; every word, every glance is a manifestation of maternal love. The Virgin Mother is the tabernacle of God’s presence; she is also the sacrament through which God the Father communicates his very life to us. The Virgin Mother lives in constant interior recollection. Her faith and her prayer merge into one life. She lives for her Son and serves him with her love, protection, and care. Her interior silence is richness, fullness, and contemplation.
She is our best guide and teacher for entering into the same attitude of interior recollection that guides and helps us to encounter God, who comes into our lives. It is an interior transformation that also takes place in us. Like Zechariah, we too enter into our insecurities and anxieties in order to receive the total goodness that comes from above. The Spirit inspires us with the language that communicates and enables us to bless and glorify the Lord.
By blessing God, we recognize him as Lord of creation, and the work of his hands visits us; his Son visits us, making himself present among us, establishing his dwelling place to care for and protect us.
The evangelist Saint Luke presents salvation to us as mercy, which is an essential characteristic of God. He is merciful and faithful. Saint Luke shows us in the person of Zechariah the personality and spirituality of the righteous man, the man who fears God, who is faithful in fulfilling his commands and who is constant in his prayer.
For on this Christmas Eve, bells will ring out in the hearts of so many men and women of good heart and good will. This Christmas Eve reminds us of the goodness that God has sown in our hearts and that impels us to praise God with inspired songs that open our hearts to the graces of our God’s mercy and tenderness.
Tonight we contemplate the Virgin Mother holding her baby, her Son, without the presence or company of her family or friends, far from her father’s house. The richest man was born poor, surrounded by simplicity and humility in a manger. Jesus chose to be poor; he could have sought and chosen luxury and comfort, but he chose to be born and live this way. Does this say something to us today?
Lord Jesus, come into our lives; remain in our hearts as you did in the humble stable in Bethlehem. Allow us to be with you as an offering and give you our lives and those of all who await you with joy and gladness.
By Fr. Robert A. Brisman, P.
Dir. Esp. MCCASD