Homily for Christmas Mass During the Night
Cathedral of St. Mary of the Assumption
Introduction
How appropriate that this one time of the year when we come together in church in the middle of the night, we hear the prophecy from the prophet Isaiah, “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.” We know that after the darkness of light dawn will arrive, bringing with it the light of day. The prophecy from Isaiah, symbolized by this Christmas Midnight Mass, is a journey from darkness to light.
Oppression
For the people at the time of the prophet Isaiah, this prophecy had some very practical, immediate political significance. Isaiah proclaimed this prophecy around 730-722 BC, when the people of God were suffering under the oppression of their powerful neighbors to the east, Assyria. The symbols of Assyrian oppression would have been clear to them: the yoke and the pole that bound the beasts of burden together by the neck, and the rod that was used to goad them. Liberation from this yoke meant political freedom.
This is what the God of Israel promises to do for them as He did once before. The day of Midian refers to a victory of God’s people many centuries before. This is in the era of the judges, charismatic leaders who would rise to lead the people against their enemies before Israel established a kingdom. Gideon was one such heroic judge who defeated the Midianites, the pagan enemies of God’s people at that time. This new leader whom God would send would be a descendent of David, the ideal king, and would usher in a new era of peace. But Isaiah makes clear that this is not to be done by political means. Rather, it is “the zeal of the Lord of hosts [that] will do this” – that is, when His people turn to Him with all their heart.
As God is want to do, He fulfilled His promise far beyond the people’s expectation by sending them His own Son, who established a Kingdom that is not of this world and so does not pass away, that is, a Kingdom that is of the world yet to come. Once again, He does this in a way that we would not have planned ourselves, for the fulfillment of this promise did not end oppression in the world. We know this painfully well in our own time! The world is still scourged by oppression. Who are your oppressors? We often think of others outside of us as those who oppress us, and, yes, sometimes this is true. But we also must consider how we sometimes oppress ourselves, with all of our obsessions and narcissism and vindictiveness and even addictions.
Liberation
Before we consider where the oppression afflicting us may may be coming from, however, let us first think about why there continues to be oppression in the world and what the way out of it is. St. Paul gives us the answer to both questions in his letter to Titus: “to reject godless ways and worldly desires and to live temperately, justly, and devoutly in this age.” This is the formula for freedom from oppression, and to the extent that it is not followed it is the cause of oppression, whether that is others doing it to us (oppression from without) or we doing it to ourselves (oppression from within). So let’s think about this.
First of all, we must reject all godless ways and worldly desires, that is, we must renounce all evil, we must free ourselves of doing those things that drag us and others down. We must instead set our hearts on the higher things, the things that last forever. We must be free from any attachment to those things that we will leave behind after we die, and focus on acquiring those things that we can take with us beyond the grave: our acts of love and the sacrifices we make for the good of others and for our fidelity to the Lord.
That is, in addition to renouncing evil we must also embrace all that is good: living temperately, which means not allowing ourselves to be controlled any kind of selfish desire; and living justly, which means to give to God and to others that which is their due; and devoutly, that our whole life may be a worship of the one, true God. We cannot, of course, make that offering of our lives to God if we don’t at least worship Him on the day that is dedicated to Him, the Lord’s Day, or the Sabbath. Worship of God on Sunday is the minimal concrete expression and safeguard to keep us on the track of offering our lives to Him, living in a way that is free from evil and embracing the good.
How to Get There
So that is what it means to live a life free of oppression. But how do we get there? Where do we find it? We must be very alert and spiritually wise, for God comes to us in ways that surprise us. Think about the Christmas story which we just heard, as St. Luke describes it to us in his Gospel: God entered this world in the middle of the night, very quietly, on the outskirts of a small, insignificant town, born in a cave serving as a stable, born into a simple, working-class family. He came into the world in a way no one would notice. You might say that God sneaked into the world. And God often works this way, He can be very sneaky amd surprise us in ways that we do not expect.
To be free from oppression, then, does not mean to lead great revolutions and overthrow the ruling parties of any given moment of history. This is what God’s people were looking for in Isaiah’s time, a leader who would step in with great military might and defeat their political enemy and reestablish their own sovereignty over their neighboring kingdoms. But God fulfilled His promise in a way that was beyond their imagination: sending His very own Son to establish an eternal Kingdom, and so not a Kingdom of this world bound by political constraints and doomed eventually to pass away.
That is not God’s Kingdom. Rather, God’s Kingdom is a spiritual kingdom, one that is found in the little acts of great love that are invisible to those who do not have spiritual vision. As St. Mother Theresa of Calcutta was fond of saying, pleasing God is not a matter of doing great things for all to see but small things with great love. One who loves is one who can give to others the gifts of patience, kindness, generosity with their time and attention, putting others before themselves, suffering for what is true and just, sacrificing for the good of others. This is what it means to love, and those who live this way are those who are truly free. These are the ones who are rich in God’s Kingdom because they have amassed for themselves treasures they can take with them beyond the grave all the way into heaven.
Conclusion
The birth of God’s Son is for us a journey from darkness to light – that is, a journey to light for those who love. He has shown us the way, so let us be on the lookout for Him. Let us not fail to notice Him and welcome Him when He sneaks into our lives, taking advantage of those opportunities He gives us to show great love even in the smallest circumstances of our life. This is how God’s Kingdom of eternal life and love and light is made present in our midst. To Him be all praise and honor and glory, now and ever and forever. Amen.
