Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus, Who came down from Heaven for the salvation of mankind.
Almost immediately after Adam and Eve committed the Original Sin and fell from grace, God promised that He would send a Savior to make things right and restore the relationship between God and man.
The entire Old Testament is filled with stories of God’s chosen people; men and women who were waiting for this Messiah because they they knew they were not able to save themselves.
The New Testament begins with the events leading up to the arrival of this long-awaited Savior, Jesus Christ. In God’s plan for the salvation of the world, He would allow his only-begotten Son to die for our sins.
But before He could suffer and die on the Cross, the Son of God would need to have a body that could be scourged and crucified.
The Second Person of the Trinity, made flesh by the power of the Holy Spirit at the Annunciation, was born of the Virgin Mary in a stable in Bethlehem for this reason.
The Catholic Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord or Christmas on December 25, a Holy Day of Obligation for Catholics.
Celebrating the birth of Christ:
God was born into our human family:
The birth of Jesus is a historical fact:
And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us, and we saw his glory, the glory as of the Father’s only Son, full of grace and truth. John testified to Him and cried out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, l ‘The One who is coming after me ranks ahead of me because He existed before me.’” From his fullness we have all received, grace in place of grace, because while the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, Who is at the Father’s side, has revealed Him.
John 1: 14-18
God had come in the flesh:
The birth of Jesus is anything but sentimental:
God asks us to choose between two kings:
We have just heard in the Gospel the message given by the angels to the shepherds during that Holy Night, a message which the Church now proclaims to us: “To you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger”. Nothing miraculous, nothing extraordinary, nothing magnificent is given to the shepherds as a sign. All they will see is a child wrapped in swaddling clothes, one who, like all children, needs a mother’s care; a child born in a stable, who therefore lies not in a cradle but in a manger. God ’s sign is the baby in need of help and in poverty. Only in their hearts will the shepherds be able to see that this baby fulfils the promise of the prophet Isaiah, which we heard in the first reading: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government will be upon his shoulder”. Exactly the same sign has been given to us. We too are invited by the angel of God, through the message of the Gospel, to set out in our hearts to see the child lying in the manger.
Pope Benedict XVI, Homily, 24 December 2006
Christmas in Bethlehem:
Jesus was born in a humble stable, into a poor family. Simple shepherds were the first witnesses to this event. In this poverty Heaven’s glory was made manifest. The Church never tires of singing the glory of this night: The Virgin today brings into the world the Eternal and the earth offers a cave to the Inaccessible. The angels and shepherds praise Him and the magi advance with the star, for You are born for us, Little Child, God eternal!
Catechism of the Catholic Church 525
Elements of Jesus’ birth anticipate his passion and death:
Remembering God’s generosity in the stuff of Christmas:
Finding Christ in the symbols of Christmas:
The Truth, Goodness, and Beauty of the Catholic Church
Echoes of Jewish tradition in the Catholic Mass:
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