Our ancestors celebrated the festivities of light since prehistoric times, knowing the calendar of the changes of day and night. The Christmas story completes the birth of light by the birth of the child. How do we experience and explain this Christmas story? Each of us does it in a different way – because we are different as persons, but also in the same way – at least regarding its universality. But, what’s really going on in this story from the New Testament? What does it bring to all people? It could be expressed by quoting the voices brought from heaven by the angels’ trumpets on the occasion of the birth of the Son of God. Ever since then it seems as if that voice sounds from heaven on every Christmas Eve: “God be praised! Peace on earth among God and the people.” This year again, with the advent of Christmas, the Angel Gabriel will enter our homes again, the sky above Bethlehem will light up, and the shining star will again announce His birth to the new generation. The Magi will again go there to bow in adoration. Celebrating it, we shall do the same on Christmas Day. Around the festival table, the decorated Christmas trees and the bright fire which must not be let to go out during the night according to tradition, the human spirit will once again get strength for the new era that is waiting for us.
Our hopes are better and fuller today, our expeditions more realistic. There is peace in our land. We have made one step across the threshold of the new era and that’s why we should “build up the Lord’s temple” according to His laws. If we try to understand this temple as our life on earth, we really have to build it according to His laws. Let us determine “...stonemasons who would hew the stones for the building according to His rules...for spiritual and worldly home to give us glory and honor... because we are newcomers before you... settlers like all our fathers. Our days upon the Earth are numbered...” Let us all do something for the happiness of those who are coming, because it is through them alone that we will also live.
If we try to understand the universality of the message of the Christmas story in this way, we shall be able to experience it in the same way.
