Christmas 2024

Greetings to all who rejoice to remember the birth of Christ on Christmas Day and who long for his coming again in glory. Blessings and peace. 

I am writing to you today in the afterglow of our diocesan gathering to light the Christmas tree in St. Mary Park and bless the Bambinelli — the images of the Christ child that will be the center of our nativity scenes this Christmas. I love to meet you and your families and to discover the diversity of ways we picture and honor the Word made flesh. 

This year you brought at least a dozen blond-haired, blue eyed models of Baby Jesus molded from plastic by Fischer-Price. This is an image of Jesus built to survive the rigors of a child’s room, and even play. There were dozens of Fontanini-style figures, even a couple of heirloom pieces carefully transported in boxes layered with packing peanuts, bubble wrap and tissue paper. Your nativities represented cultures from around the world — the Holy Land, Kenya and Japan were among them. There were even abstract images, less-formed bits of clay with a line here and a hint there suggesting more than depicting a child swaddled with loving care. 

St. Teresa of Avila writes of books she read that counseled against such images, even to represent the humanity of the incarnate Jesus. These would-be spiritual advisers argued that attachments to images, even of Christ, were a hindrance to contemplative prayer. The saint attempted to follow this advice but found it lacking. Teresa came to learn that such images that stir our connection and devotion to the humanity of Christ were not a hindrance, but a great help for growth in holiness. 

“I thought the humanity was an impediment [to prayer] … I had been so devoted all my life to Christ, … and then I always returned to my custom of rejoicing in this Lord, especially when I received Communion. I wanted to keep ever before my eyes a painting or image of Him since I was unable to keep Him as engraved in my soul as I desired. Is it possible, my Lord, that it entered my mind even for an hour that You would be an impediment to my greater good? Where have all my blessings come from but from you?” 

Teresa records this episode in her life, she says, to help us understand how great the error of renouncing these images of Jesus can be and how it can impoverish our prayer. 

Christmas is filled with opportunities to encounter the image of Christ — in art, nativities, on Christmas cards, in the praying community adoring at the manger and the altar, in the faces of our poor neighbors and those who serve them with charity, and most perfectly in the Most Holy Eucharist. 

In whichever ways we encounter something of his face this Christmas, may Christ be engraved on our souls. May we be more deeply conformed to the holy one who comes to be our love and our light. May our families and communities overflow with his presence and redound to the glory of his name. 

My prayer for you this Christmas Day is the same that I offered for each person and family at the Blessing of the Bambinelli on the Third Sunday of Advent. May Christ be always in your heart and in your home. 

Merry Christmas! As we celebrate the birth of the Word made flesh, let us love one another. 

Yours in the Joy and Love of Christmas,
+Bishop John Iffert