Some ten years ago, Pope Benedict XVI spoke these words: ‘Again and again it astonishes us that God makes himself a child so that we may love him, so that we may dare to love him, and as a child trustingly lets himself be taken into our arms. It is as if God were saying: I know that my glory frightens you, and that you are trying to assert yourself in the face of my grandeur. So now I am coming to you as a child, so that you can accept me and love me’.

Amid all the frenetic activity, there is a still point – the still point of Mary and Joseph, and the holy Child being born. May we, too, find our way to that still point, and there rest in prayerful expectation for the Nativity. May God bless you richly in His coming into your heart.