Thoughts in prayer the day after Christmas


Rivka, from the Jerusalem kehilla, reflects on Christmas and the day after:

Christmas is always an intensely full day: last-minute preparations, decorations, cookies, then prayers and festive meals, party and presents… lots of joy with little time to stop and consider it. Usually, the prayer the day after is the first where I find time to stop, to receive a bit more of that which was given during Christmas day, and to let it all echo within me, within my prayer.

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christmas reflection

Mary and Joseph arriving in Bethlehem and searching for shelter: pregnant Mary with the life within her, and in her beauty something of the images of the pregnant mothers who were at the day’s Mass in our kehilla. Joseph and Mary going from house to house on the cold night, knocking on doors, and all around them the silhouettes of the many people who also come in our day to ask for shelter for themselves, for their families. How many pregnant women are there among them, how many babies born along the way or on arrival in a strange country? A prayer for them, that they may find an open door, a welcoming house…or at least a warm and sheltered place in their time of need.

The baby in the manger, the newborn Savior. Mary holding him close, Joseph in his tallit (prayer shawl), saying the blessing for the birth of a son… and for an instant Jesus’ image was replaced by that of another infant, a little Eritrean baby who smiled at me the day before with shining eyes. And when I came back to the newborn Son of God, his legs too kicked joyfully in the air from his mother’s arms…

The toddlers who tried incessantly during the Mass to approach the candles and flowers before the altar. At that moment, I was mainly worried that they might reach the candles…but the next day what remained was the awareness of the way they stood there, fascinated by the beauty, and their intense will to come closer to it: didn’t the shepherds stand thus when they came to discover the newborn Messiah?

“And from his fullness have we all received, grace upon grace”: the grace of Christmas is always beyond our comprehension, beyond our ability to receive. Yet, we are called each time to try to receive, to take into ourselves a bit more of this great mystery, and to let it penetrate all our life. Each baby we welcome, every child that lets us see something of his joy, each person we meet….from all of them we can learn something of the great mystery that we celebrate on Christmas: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”.

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