According to Luke, the angelic host sang to the shepherds,
“Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among
those whom he favors.” Christmas is the celebration of peace on
earth, for it means that God is in our midst. The mystery of the
incarnation is that God comes to us. We do not have to go to
God: God comes to us. In our reflective moments, of course, we
smile at the fanciful stories surrounding the birth of Jesus,
taking them with a grain of salt even as we love them. Even the
logic of God “coming to us” is fancifully symbolic: God is our
Creator and we are nothing without God. God cannot be apart from
us at all, else we would not exist. So God cannot literally come
to us from somewhere else. But we live in the dark about the
foundations of our own existence so much of the time that the
light that enlightens our true estate seems dimmed. The
incarnation means that this true light has not been overcome by
the darkness and in fact the light in Jesus calls this to our
attention in saving ways.