On the Birth of Christ

Contents

Reading pages: 1127–1143 · 1145–1149

1. 1127Gregory opens the Christmas sermon with the psalm's call to blow the trumpet, reading the feast as the true Tabernacles, in which God pitched the tent of human nature through the Virgin.
2. 1129The prophets and apostles are trumpets that restore creation's single feast with the angelic powers; the birth of Christ at the winter solstice signifies that the night of sin has reached its limit and the true light now grows.
3. 1131Like a physician who waits for a fever to reach its peak, God waited until every form of evil had shown itself in history before coming at the end of the ages to crush the dragon's heads.
4. 1133Evil persists like the twitching tail of a slain snake, whose head Christ has crushed until death itself is abolished at the end; the Magi, descendants of Balaam, followed the star he foretold.
5. 1135Isaiah foretold a virgin birth; Mary became mother and remained virgin, as the burning bush that was not consumed prefigured, and the birth of John to barren Elizabeth prepared belief in it.
6. 1137Zechariah, foreseeing the virgin birth, let Mary stand among the virgins in the temple and was killed for it; the angels' hymn proclaims peace on earth, and Gregory begins the apocryphal story of Mary's birth.
7. 1139Gregory continues the apocryphal account of Mary's dedication and betrothal to Joseph as guardian of her virginity, and reads her question to Gabriel (“I do not know a man”) as evidence that she had vowed virginity.
8. 1141Gabriel's answer shows that the Spirit made Mary's flesh his vessel and the power of the Most High, Christ, took form in her; the cave, the swaddling clothes, the census and the manger each signify what Christ came to undo.
9. 1143Christ lies in the manger as the bread of life for Jews and Gentiles; the Gentile Magi recognize and honor him while Herod and Jerusalem are troubled, and Herod's slaughter of the infants is both cruel and senseless.
10. 1145Gregory describes the massacre of the infants of Bethlehem in vivid detail, including mothers of two children, then turns back to the joy of the feast, in which the sun of righteousness shines through our own nature.
11. 1147The Nativity restores fallen humanity; Mary answers for Eve as the cross answers for the tree, and the birth is the beginning of every saving act celebrated at Pascha, so no one should scorn God's way of saving us.
12. 1149God's goodness, wisdom, justice and power all met in the Incarnation: he paid a ransom to the captor rather than using force, was not held by death, and touched our impurity without being stained by it.