Thought for the Week

I WAS totally intrigued by our neighbour’s lights.

I just couldn’t work them out at all. They covered the house and even went over the roof with not a wire in sight. A million lights danced and glistened in the darkness but nothing was visible in daylight.

It was a mystery. Then someone explained to me that it is all done by projection and they are not real lights at all. I love the Christmas lights. Light in the darkness is central to the Christmas story.

Jesus is born in the deepest darkness – in the middle of the night at the winter solstice.

This is not historical time – not a historical fact about the date of Jesus’s birth. It is parabolic time, metaphorical time, sacred time, symbolic time.

Nobody knows the day, the month or the season of the year of Jesus’s birth. But the symbolism is perfect. In the time of deepest darkness, in the middle of the night, in the middle of winter on the longest night of the year, Jesus is born. He is the light of the world. Imagine darkness before we had any artificial light. Imagine the dark months of winter where there were just a few daylight hours to do all that was necessary before the cloak of darkness enveloped the world and its people once again.

When night fell, it was dark, very dark. Wintered souls longed for light.

So let us project the true light this Christmas and shine its rays into the dark corners of the world where hope may be born again.

Have a peaceful Christmas and may the Christ light guide you through this coming year.