December 25
“Dearly beloved, today our Saviour is born; let us rejoice. Sadness should have no place on the birthday of life. The fear of death has been swallowed up; life brings us joy with the promise of eternal happiness. No one is shut out from this joy; all share the same reason for rejoicing. Our Lord, victor over sin and death, finding no man free from sin, came to free us all.”
-St. Leo the Great
The “yoga wars” are hotter than ever, with both sides staking out their positions and hammering their tent pegs ever deeper into the ground, but for everyday people like 54 year-old Priscilla de George (not her real name), this isn’t a matter of taking sides – it’s a matter of life and death.
December 24
“No one is excluded from the joy brought by the Lord. The great joy announced by the angels on Christmas night is truly for all people, both for the people of Israel then anxiously awaiting a Savior, and for the numberless people made up of all those who, in time to come, would receive its message and strive to live by it.”
–St. Paul VI
The next battleground in the fight to protect human life appears to be the fight to ban the mailing of abortion pills into pro-life states. Two states, Texas and Tennessee, are the first to initiate action against this practice which could have national implications on this increasingly dangerous practice.
December 23
“We desire to be able to welcome Jesus at Christmas-time, not in a cold manger of our heart, but in a heart full of love and humility, a heart so pure, so immaculate, so warm with love for one another.”
-St. Teresa of Calcutta
December 22
“Wake up, O human being! For it was for you that God was made man. Rise up and realize it was all for you. Eternal death would have awaited you had He not been born in time. Never would you be freed from your sinful flesh had He not taken to Himself the likeness of sinful flesh. Everlasting would be your misery had He not performed this act of mercy. You would not have come to life again had He not come to die your death. You would have perished had He not come.”
–St. Augustine
December 21
“We consider Christmas as the encounter, the great encounter, the historical encounter, the decisive encounter, between God and mankind. He who has faith knows this truly; let him rejoice.”
–St. Paul VI
December 20
“At this Christmas when Christ comes, will He find a warm heart? Mark the season of Advent by loving and serving the others with God’s own love and concern.”
–St. Teresa of Calcutta
December 19
“Rejoice and be glad that so great and good a Lord, on coming into the Virgin’s womb, willed to appear despised, needy, and poor in this world, so that men who were in dire poverty and suffering great need of heavenly food might be made rich in him.”
–St. Clare of Assisi
December 18
“… the spirituality of waiting is not simply our waiting for God. It is also participating in God’s waiting for us …”
-Henri J. M. Nouwen
