The First Nativity Scene

In 1224, inspired by the sight of shepherds tending their flocks in the moonlight, St. Francis of Assisi asked a wealthy friend from Greccio, Italy, to ...

Christ Became One of Us

John Howard Griffin was a white man who believed he could never understand the plight of African-Americans unless he became like one. In 1959, he darkened ...

Inoffensive Celebration

To avoid offending anybody, the schools dropped religion altogether and started singing about the weather. At my son's school, they now hold the winter ...

A Christmas Revolution

It was on Christmas Eve, after a Romanian church had gathered for candlelight service, that the Communist soldiers came to take the pastor. The people ...

Newborn Babe

What a paradox that a babe in a manger should be called mighty! Yet even as a baby, Jesus Christ revealed power. His birth affected the heavens as that ...

We Are Shepherds

I read about a little boy who was in his first Christmas pageant. He was 5. He was one of the shepherds--you know, they wear their bathrobes and their ...

The Mysterious Incarnation

In this poem written some 15 centuries ago, Augustine tried to capture the mystery of the Incarnation:

Maker of the sun,

He is made under the sun.

In the ...

Changing Places

The stunning point of Christmas is that God considered my needs and the worth of my relationship to Him to be sufficient cause to go through the trauma ...

A Stupendous and Astonishing Wonder

Christmas for millions is just "the holiday season." Are we losing the sense of marvel at the Christmas miracle? Why, this is the most stupendous ...

Incarnation's Meaning

The Son of God became man to enable men to become the sons of God.