A special gift at Christmastime

Dear Sisters and Brothers in Christ,

In preparation for the celebration of Christmas, many of us were tempted to max out our credit cards and to fill our shopping carts with gifts that we hope would be useful to members of our family and appreciated by our friends.

The uncertainty of the relevance of this over-spending makes Christmas shopping a struggle and, not infrequently, a frustration. And then there's the day of reckoning when payment comes due and the cost of our impulsive buying becomes apparent.

How can we change that scenario? How can we avoid losing the spirit of Christmas to the forces of commercialism? How can we bring the manger to the forefront and put Christ back into Christmas celebrations?

When the malls opened their doors on "Black Friday" to the surge of shoppers, what treasures did they succeed in finding that were worth the stress and sometimes even the violent struggle?

The answers to all of those questions lie in our perspective. What if we exchanged shopping carts for "shopping hearts"?

To carry this analogy to its logical conclusion would be to fill our hearts with a gift that is well within our budget, one that wear-and-tear will not tarnish.

The gift I speak of is the one given us by the Father on that midnight eve in Bethlehem more than 2,000 years ago. It is the gift that will return dividends 100-fold -- no deposit required and absolutely no interest due.

All this will be possible if we open our hearts to the celebration of the true mystery of Christmas: the Son of God, who did not cling to His divinity, but wrapped Himself in our human nature and was placed by His Father in a manger as gift for humankind.

Jesus, our treasure, freely given to the world so long ago, can continue to be a gift today through our extended kindness, compassion, forgiveness and generosity.

I pray these will be the spiritual gifts we exchange with family, friends and community during the coming year. As we unwrap them in the routine of our daily lives, we may be sure that our God of surprises will not be outdone in generosity.

May this Christmas and New Year embrace you, your loved ones and all of humanity with the gift of peace that Christ longs to bring to each and every heart.

Remember, where your treasure is, there also is your heart.

Faithfully yours in Christ,

Howard J. Hubbard 
Bishop of Albany

(12/20/07)