Nativity of the Lord
Massimo Palombella
“God, by assuming humanity, completed it when he united in his person two realities that are distant from each other, namely human nature and divine nature. The latter conferred divinity and the former received it” (Petrus Lombardus, Sententiae, lib. III, dist. 6, ex Gregory Nazianzen [Or. 38, 13; Or. 29, 19]).
With Christmas, with the historical event of God becoming man, we celebrate the fulfilment, the “completion” of our humanity, the profound meaning of every fragment, every small segment of our personal humanity.
Nothing is lost, nothing is to be forgotten, nothing is to be censured, but everything, absolutely everything, is part of a plan of love that envelops us, precedes us and follows us.
We are worth God’s poor birth, his being a child, his growing up, his suffering, his being betrayed, his insults and mockery, his cross, his death. We are worth his κένωσις (kénōsis), his emptying.
All our suffering, all our separation, all our unresolved issues, all our worries, all our burdens… Everything in Him can be given meaning, everything in Him can be transfigured, everything in Him can become “life in abundance”.
In that defenceless and needy child, there is each one of us, with resurrection and eternity indelibly written in our being.
In the Liturgy of the Hours previous to the Liturgical Reform of the Second Vatican Council, the fourth responsory of Matins on Christmas Day had the following text:
O magnum mysterium et admirabile sacramentum,
ut animalia viderent Dominum natum iacentem in praesepio.
O beata Virgo, cuius viscera meruerunt portare Dominum Iesum Christum. Alleluia.
(O great mystery and wondrous sacrament,
that animals should see the newborn Lord, lying in a manger!
Blessed is the Virgin whose womb was worthy to bear Christ the Lord. Alleluia).
The attached music is by Tomás Luis de Victoria and comes from the book of Motets for 4, 5, 6 or 8 voices published in Venice in 1572 by the printing house of Antonio Gardano’s sons (Motecta que partim quaternis, partim quinis, alia senis, alia octonis vocibus concinuntur [Venetiis, apud Filios Antonii Gardani, 1572]). The live performance is by the Schola Cantorum Veneradae Fabricae at the Christmas Concert in Milan Cathedral on 18 December 2025.
Merry Christmas and heartfelt greetings.
link to the entire concert:
