“It was the first time that I went to a parish under the diocese of Kottayam to celebrate the Yeldo liturgy. I reached there by 2 AM. The altar assistant was very busy and said that we would start the liturgy by 3 AM. At 3 AM, the altar assistant said that we should wait a little longer since nobody had arrived. I told him, “you stay here. I am going to start the prayers.” The prayers started but still no one came.
Then, a lizard appeared and so did a cockroach. I
was grieved on seeing this situation.
The Lord said: “Don’t be sad about it. When I was
born, I opened My eyes to see cattle and sheep around Me”. On understanding
this, my sadness withered away.”- His Grace Geevarghese Mar Ivanios
Metropolitan of blessed memory.
The scene of the nativity of Christ, amidst the
animals and the shepherds who tend the sheep, reminds of our primal connection
with nature. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son,
that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For
God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the
world through Him might be saved.” (St. John 3:16,17 NKJV). Our restricted view
considers Incarnation of our Lord for the cause of humans alone, however the
Gospel underlines that God loved the world. Henri Nouwen writes in Bread for
the Journey:
“When we think of oceans and mountains, forests and
deserts, trees, plants and animals, the sun, the moon, the stars, and all the
galaxies as God’s creation, waiting eagerly to be 'brought into the same
glorious freedom as the children of God' (Romans 8:21), we can only stand in
awe of God’s majesty and God’s all-embracing plan of salvation. It is not just
we, human beings, who wait for salvation in the midst of our suffering; all of
creation groans and moans with us, longing to reach its full freedom... Yes, we
have to love the fields full of wheat, the snowcapped mountains, the roaring
seas, the wild and tame animals, the huge redwoods, and the little daisies.
Everything in creation belongs, with us, to the large family of God.”
St Isaac of Syria taught that in the presence of a
humble person the ferocity of the wild beasts is tamed. It is so because the
scent from the humble person is the same as which came from Adam before the
Fall (the scent of humility); wherein Adam had affectionate relations with all
the beasts, and he gave the names to them in Paradise. This scent was taken
away from humanity and given back anew by Christ through His advent.
A story from the tradition of desert fathers and
mothers goes like this- one day while abba Macarius was praying in his cave in
the desert, a hyena suddenly appeared and began to lick his feet and taking him
gently by the hem of his tunic, she drew him towards her own cave. He
followed her, saying, "I wonder what this animal wants me to do?"
When she had led him to her cave, she went in and brought her cubs which had
been born blind.
He prayed over them and returned
them to the hyena with their sight healed. She in turn, by way
of thanks-offering, brought a huge skin of a ram and laid it at Abba
Macarius’s feet. He smiled at her kindly, took the skin and spread it under his
feet.
If we slow down enough to notice the expression on
the face of infants, we will see that they look at their surroundings with a
sense of amazement. As we grew, we ignored the sense of sacredness and awe in
comprehending the world around us that quietly and continually preached the
glory of God.
The Nativity of our Lord coming at the end of the
yearly journey is a milestone to renew hope for the onward voyage. The
commercial dynamics teach us the more we spend, the better we have celebrated
Christmas. Our Christmases have become merrier in a worldly sense, but we have
forgotten to share the flame of hope that the birth of our Lord proclaims. Five
years back, enroute on our visit to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem we
were given a general advice that those with infants/toddlers need not stand in
the long queue to the Altar of Nativity (an underground space which marks the
spot where Jesus was born) and could directly go to this Altar by means of
another route. As we reached the church there were a multitude of pilgrims and
we somehow couldn’t get in touch with the tour personnel to get information on
this alternative route. With a year-old baby in arms, who would get cranky
easily in a crowd, I had almost made up my mind that the baby and I would miss
the Nativity Altar. Suddenly, a tour guide from another group- a
considerate cheerful old man with a black and white keffiyeh around his neck
asked if we were Orthodox (and he was too). He said that we need not wait in
the queue and gave us clear instructions on how to proceed to the Altar of Nativity.
We went to the holy place with hearts full of gratitude and the baby kissed the
place where our Lord was born. A silent miracle witnessed.
In the elderly man, we saw the shepherds ‘who made
widely known the things concerning Baby Jesus (St. Luke 2:17). In the midst of
tiredness and dejection, as we heard this elderly man’s guidance, we felt how
Jesus Christ wants the little children to come to Him (St. Luke 18) even to the
cave where He was born.
The shepherds- common everyday folks- shared the
Gospel with others serving as a model for us to be the quotidian harbingers of
hope to others once the celebrations and noise are over. A translated excerpt
from Kaikkudnna (by ‘Saker’- His Grace Zechariah Mar Severios
Metropolitan, Baselian Books) is as follows:
“It is saddening to see that our dealings and
interactions with others hardly fail to generate a sense of optimism and faith
in others. It is frightening to think about how many days in our lifetime have
passed, without us, having presented hope and courage to those whom we met.
When will the time come, when our visitation to our neighbour’s home offers him
comfort? How much more time is needed for our words to become a source of hope
and relief to our colleague? We need to think if we are indeed becoming blessings
for our homes.
In a poem, a tree asks a man: “For so many years,
you all have cut my branches to make ‘crosses’. But why don’t we see a Christ
amongst you?””
In
Christ,
Rincy
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