At Christmas, Imitating God in His Service to the Weakest

In his last general audience of the year in Saint Peter’s Square in Rome, Pope Francis dwelt at length on Christmas, the “Christmas of Jesus”, “a feast of trust and hope that overcomes uncertainty and pessimism”.

The reason for our hope? “God is with us, and God still trusts us”, Pope Francis answers. In this continuing season of Advent, the Supreme Pontiff invited the faithful “to contemplate the lowering of the Son of God, who came to save us, in order to imitate him in the service of the weakest people around us.”

On this occasion, “the earth is no longer only a ‘valley of tears,’ but it also becomes the place where God has pitched his tent, the place of encounter with him.” “He willed to share our human condition, the Holy Father continues, showing us his mercy and his love for mankind. The child of Bethlehem warms and transforms our heart; he enables us not to sink into sadness, weariness, or discouragement.” The Christmas of Jesus, the Pope goes on to recount, shows that God “is once and for all on the side of man, to save us, to lift us up from the dust of our miseries, our difficulties, our sins”.

At Christmas, God “lowers himself and draws near to the little ones, to the poor”, Francis explains, “he invites us to imitate him.” “From now on, whatever we do to our neighbor, it is to Jesus that we do it. May the Mother of Jesus help us to recognize in the face of the weakest the image of the Son of God made man!”

Christmas leads the Pope to two considerations: the first indicates that in this celebration, God “does not reveal himself as the one who dominates the universe, but as the One who lowers himself: he comes down to earth little and poor. This means that we must be like him.” To which the Pope adds: it is “a bad thing when a Christian does not want to lower himself, does not want to serve.” This is, for the Supreme Pontiff, a “Christian who struts about, a pagan.”
The second consequence, the Pope explains: “if God, through Jesus, has become involved with man to the point of becoming like one of us, this means that whatever we do to a brother or a sister, we will have done it to him.”

Source: News.va