Thinking Anew: This Sunday the first chapter of St John's Gospel will be read in Christian churches around the world. It can well be described as a watershed in universal literature. It is the account of God becoming man.
St John tells his readers that the Word became flesh.
"In the beginning was the Word: the Word was with God and the Word was God.He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things came to be, not one thing had its being but through him." (St John 1:1-3.)
Further down that text John writes: "The Word was the true light that enlightens all men; and he was coming into the world. He was in the world that had its being through him, and the world did not know him." (John 1:9-11.)
The feast of Christmas is above all the celebration of the incarnation, the celebration of our belief in the reality that God becomes man and creates a link between mankind and God. We have been raised to a new status.
An acceptance or a belief in the fact that God becomes man requires a leap of faith. It is in many ways a mystery but that is not to say that it is contrary to reason. It might well be beyond our rational understanding.
The feast of Christmas and our advance to a New Year is an appropriate time to consider to what we are doing with our lives, individually and in the context of our community.
For many people the notion of mystery is a crass way of making them accept all sorts of superstition. But the prospect of mystery in our lives can also fill us with wonder and excitement.
No one can or should be forced to believe in God or in Jesus Christ. But in believing in God and in Jesus there is the added advantage that we might become caught up in the mystery of God, the mystery of the incarnation.
Some might argue there can be no place for such sentimental thinking in a high-powered modern economy.
A wiser counsel will suggest that once we remove mystery from our lives we lose a fundamental aspect of being human.
Christians believe that the incarnation links man with God and makes present the reality of God in this world. Surely,being conscious of the presence of God, the mystery and wonder of God around us has to be an enhancing ingredient to our lives.
Every good act we do helps make God's presence more real to us and for Catholics the celebration of the Eucharist is the finest possible celebration of the presence of God among us. The Eucharist makes God present in our lives in a sacramental way. It is also is a profound statement about the communitarian aspect of God's presence among us.
There is an awareness in our society at present that we are becoming more vulgar, more arrogant, less tolerant towards those we do not understand or with whom we do not empathise. The new, in-your-face-prosperity can bring with it a sense that we have all the answers, that we know everything and we are the masters of the human race.
In that culture or dispensation there is little room left for mystery. We seem to become bereft of all sense of gentleness and sensitivity. The warlords of industry and economic success bludgeon us with the dogma of fiscal rectitude. With it can come an appalling arrogance and vulgarity that manifests itself right across all the various strata of society.
A consciousness of the presence of God in our lives gives us the possibility of being more gentle with other people. It can make us more open to doing things a different way, it can help us in our relationship with other people and restrain us from all attempts at wanting to control and dominate.
That is not at all to say that people who do not believe in God or the incarnation cannot be gentle and open to mystery, nor does it mean that people who do believe cannot be arrogant and vulgar.
But a true and rounded belief in the mystery of God and in his son Jesus Christ is surely a help to us in living out our daily lives.
The beginning of a New Year is an ideal time to ask ourselves if we have lost the sense of wonder in our lives; and if so, might not an intelligent and holy approach to the mystery of God help us in our challenge of discovering who we are and in improving our relationship with those with whom we live and work?
A holy and happy New Year to all.
M.C.