The Dispatch: More from CWR...

Leaving home for Christmas

We who call ourselves followers of Christ are meant to demonstrate in our lives “that we really are what we have been made, by renouncing the world while in the world, and living as in the presence of God.”

(Image: Casey Horner/Unsplash.com)

Although coming home for Christmas is a beautiful holiday tradition greatly to be cherished, it nevertheless occurs to me that leaving home for Christmas, correctly understood, is equally or even more important.

When you think of it, leaving home certainly has good precedent. After all, as the time was drawing near for the first Christmas, Mary and Joseph packed a few belongings, left their home in Nazareth, and headed southward toward the Judean town of David called Bethlehem.

Joseph was obliged to go there by an edict from the emperor in far-off /Rome instructing Jewish men to travel to their ancestral towns in order to be counted in a census. But what about Mary? Why did she, well along in pregnancy as she was, undertake this arduous journey?

The answer, which I suggest in my new book The Life of Jesus Christ, is based on a prophecy, found in the Old Testament book of Micah, that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. From the time of the Annunciation nearly nine months earlier, Mary had linked that prophecy to her child. But how, she must have wondered, would God arrange for her to go to Bethlehem? Now the census provided the answer. So with Joseph, off to Bethlehem she went.

That’s fine for Mary and Joseph, someone may be thinking, but what’s it got to do with saying we should leave home for Christmas?

In answering that, let me begin with St. Paul’s words about the Incarnation. Imitate the humility of Christ, he tells the Philippians, “who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Phil 2:5-7). In doing this, Paul tells us, Jesus Christ gave us an example of humbling oneself for the sake of others that we are called to imitate.

To see what that means, consider another of my favorites, St. John Henry Newman, who in one of his Christmas homilies says this: “With a wonderful condescension Christ came…in weakness, in the form of a servant, in the likeness of that fallen creature whom he purposed to restore.” And in still another Christmas sermon, Newman draws the practical conclusion: we who call ourselves followers of Christ are meant to demonstrate in our lives “that we really are what we have been made, by renouncing the world while in the world, and living as in the presence of God.”

“At other seasons of the year,” he adds, “we are reminded of watching, toiling, struggling, and suffering; but at this season we are reminded simply of God’s gifts towards us sinners….We come to be made whole. We come as little children to be fed and taught.”

And that, neither more nor less, is what I mean when I speak of leaving home for Christmas—putting aside, at least for a little while, the deceptively comfortable “home” of distraction and alienation from the things of God and accepting, like little children as far as we can manage it, that wonderful gift of Christ’s self-giving in the Incarnation.

On that note allow me to conclude with this beautiful Christmas prayer by St. John Henry Newman:

“May each Christmas, as it comes, find us more and more like him, who as at this time became a little child for our sake, more simple-minded, more humble, more holy, more affectionate, more resigned, more happy, more full of God.”

Merry Christmas.


If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!

Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.


About Russell Shaw 291 Articles
Russell Shaw was secretary for public affairs of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops/United States Catholic Conference from 1969 to 1987. He is the author of 20 books, including Nothing to Hide, American Church: The Remarkable Rise, Meteoric Fall, and Uncertain Future of Catholicism in America, Eight Popes and the Crisis of Modernity, and, most recently, The Life of Jesus Christ (Our Sunday Visitor, 2021).

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

All comments posted at Catholic World Report are moderated. While vigorous debate is welcome and encouraged, please note that in the interest of maintaining a civilized and helpful level of discussion, comments containing obscene language or personal attacks—or those that are deemed by the editors to be needlessly combative or inflammatory—will not be published. Thank you.


*