Therein…lies the mystery of Christmas.
“God…almighty maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible” renounces Godliness for our flesh: flesh that is thrust out of a mother’s womb, that suckles a mother’s breast, that pees and poops.
Whose cells divide and grow, and whose heart expands in wisdom and understanding.
+Bernadette Gasslein I must confess to you in all honesty that for me God is and has always been an absolute mystery. I do not understand what God is; no one can.
We have intimations, inklings; we make faltering, inadequate attempts to put mystery into words, but there is no word for it, no sentence for it.
+Karl Rahner
THISYEAR I CHOOSETO SHARE the meaning of Christmas from a specific religious perspective, that of a Catholic Sister who from a very early age learned that Jesus, the Son of God, came to earth as one of us to save us from our sins and to make the world a better place. The Franciscan theologian John Dun Scotus went deeper into the meaning of Christ’s birth by describing his coming, his Incarnation, as God wanting to become one of us out of sheer love for us. The Incarnation, therefore, in Franciscan spirituality, is centered on love and not sin.
As I move along in my own spiritual journey, I have come to appreciate that what I learned in the third grade was mysterious enough for me at that time in my life and it pretty much carried me through many years in my life. As I too grew in “wisdom and age,” I began to notice that I was being called to a more open vision of just who God is and where does Jesus fit into my life. When I encountered the elders in my ministry and those who care for them, I often asked them the question, “Who is God for you at this stage of your life?” I was often surprised to learn that the third-grade view was still intact and any offering of a newer or deeper level was suspect and even rejected. This made me wonder why we haven’t grown in our religious beliefs, and it became a focus for my own ministry with the elders and those religious leaders in their churches who were not meeting this significant developmental need among their elders.
How does one reach a deeper level in the area of spirituality and religion? How does one deal with the mysteries of life including one’s image of God? Personally, I have been taught through meditation, spiritual reading, Bible study courses, and retreats, especially among God’s creation, that the mystery of God can be found and felt at various times and places. Being able to see God in my neighbor and experience God’s love through the kindness of others are just a few ways that this mystery is revealed. Granted, these experiences pass almost as quickly as they come, and I think that is just how God wants it to be so I don’t get too dependent on just one way of seeing God in my life. Father Ronald Rolheiser shared this story in his book, Against an Infinite Horizon: The Finger of God in Our Everyday Lives: A little girl, drawing a picture, was asked by her mother: “What are you drawing?” She replied: “A picture of God!”
“But we don’t know what God looks like,” her mom objected.
“Well,” replied the child, “when I am finished with this then you will know what God looks like!”
My Christmas gift to you is to encourage you to take some time to consider who God is to you in light of Bernadette Gasslein’s fleshly description of Jesus, Karl Rahner’s words about the mystery of God, and the little girl’s need to draw a picture of God. Which one speaks to you at this time in your life?
Sister Mary Thill is a Sylvania Franciscan Sister. She can be reached at mthill@sistersosf.org. ✲
