Every year we celebrate the solemnity of the Annunciation of Our Lord. You know the story – Mary was in Nazareth, when we have to imagine she quite unexpectedly had a visit from an angel who announced to her that God had chosen her for an extraordinary role in the history of the human race.

She would conceive and carry a child who would be the savior of the world.

We celebrated the Annunciation back in April – nine months ago. Human life begins at conception and since Jesus is fully man, his human nature began at conception, too.

Jesus is very special though because he is fully God as well. So he was conceived in a special way by the power of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Today we gather, like we do and like we have, to celebrate his birth.

We celebrate his birth in a way we don’t celebrate anyone else’s because there is nobody else like Jesus. Well, sort of… I’ll come back to that in a second.

As we gather to celebrate his birth we are filled with joy because he has come to us as promised; he has come to us like we’ve been anticipating; he’s come to us as God in the flesh; he’s come to save us.

He came as a baby, a helpless baby. A regular baby boy, who no doubt cried, ate, slept, and wanted his mom to hold him.

And his mom did hold him. Other people did too, because that’s what we do with babies. We hold them, and talk to them. Sometimes people say babies are “adorable.” 

In Jesus’s case that’s really true. When we adore Jesus we talk to him, pray to him, worship him. That’s what it means to “adore” and to be “adorable.” In fact, as Catholics, Jesus is the one person we truly adore.

It’s very fitting that Jesus came to us like he did – as a baby – because we approach babies and hold them and stare at them and talk to babies. We kind of adore them.

He came to us so we could talk to him, pray to him, worship him. He came to us so we could adore him. And so we do.

There are three moments in his life that I think of especially when I think of adoring Jesus. 

The first is his birth, of course. It’s a huge moment. We mark the years of our calendar based on his birth. He’s God our creator and our savior lying there in that manger. We set aside time every year during the nine months after his conception and especially the weeks right before the celebration of Christmas to prepare for his arrival; to prepare room in our hearts once again for his birth and to renew our joy in the hope that he brings.

Our prayers at this celebration are prayers of wonder, and prayers of hope, and prayers of light, and prayers of faith and prayers of joy and peace – because we know who he is, and why he came, and what he will do.

And that brings me to the second moment in his life that makes me think of adoration. His crucifixion. This baby will grow up and give his life for us on that cross; for us and for our sins. The season of Advent helps to prepare us for his adorable birth. The season of Lent helps to prepare us for his adorable cross. 

The might sound a little strange to some people – but not to us – because we do adore him on the cross, because by his holy cross he redeemed the world. His suffering and death there lead to his resurrection, which we celebrate at every Mass. So we adore him on the cross.

The third thing that draws my mind to adoration when I think of Jesus is his presence in the Eucharist. At the Last Supper he said, “This is my body…. this is my blood…” When the priest holds up the Body and Blood of Jesus at Mass – we adore him there.

We can approach the baby Jesus in his crib in faith and hope and adoration.

We can approach the grown man Jesus on the cross in faith and hope and adoration.

We can approach the resurrected Jesus in the Eucharist in faith and hope and adoration.

Earlier I said we celebrate Jesus’s birth in such a special way because there is nobody else like Jesus. And that’s true – except – we are all meant to become like Jesus. By his coming here, and through his death and resurrection he allows us to share in his life; to be like him.

During Mass there is a moment when the deacon takes a little water and pours it into the wine and says quietly, “By the mystery of this water and wine, may we come to share in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity.”

Jesus is the coming together of the divine and human and through him we are supposed to carry on that union, that communion of God and man.

He humbled himself to share in our humanity; in other words, the second person of the Trinity took on flesh and was born one day as a little boy. That’s what we celebrate at Christmas.

He humbled himself to share in our humanity. If you meditate on that phrase you hear how it summarizes the amazing wonder of the incarnation, of God becoming man; the amazing wonder of Jesus in all the ways he gives himself to us, but also of the wonder of us becoming like him. 

Never forget that as much as we love the baby Jesus – no matter how much we love Jesus in all the ways he gives himself to us – he loves us more. He loves you more.

He delights in you. He rejoices over you.

There is a song, which is very popular during this season called, “Oh Come All Ye Faithful.” That song has the triple repetition of the phrase, “Oh, Come let us Adore Him.”

It is a perfect summary of our joy, our exaltation, our faith, and our hope – 

• All wrapped up in swaddling clothes as he gives himself to us as a new born baby, 
• All beat up hanging on the cross as he gives himself to us as a sacrifice,
• And fully Resurrected in Glory, truly present on the altar, as he gives himself to us in the Eucharist.

Oh, come let us adore him.

Oh, come let us adore him.

Oh, come let us adore him – Christ the Lord.

Merry Christmas.