It is New Year’s Day. Midnight has been marked with the usual eruption of noise. If there was silence in heaven for half an hour, there was limitless noise in the city for that same period. The sky filled with fireworks, the air with their smell, one’s ears with the thump of the explosions.
In Rome anything that can make noise is used: one year I saw a neighbour on his balcony shooting a rifle into the sky, perhaps believing it would be doubly effective. For it seems that this instinct to make as much noise as possible has ancient, primitive roots. The turning of the year is a vulnerable moment, a changeover that has to be carefully guarded, lest witches, ghosts and demons slip through the gap and get up to all kinds of mischief in our world. The antidote is to make lots of noise, to scare away any malevolent creature that might try to get through.
Remember the transition to the year 2000 when our technologically advanced culture held its breath lest the “millennium bug”, called Y2K, would succeed in paralysing all the computer systems of the world. An ancient and primitive fear asserting itself even within a modern and sophisticated culture.
As we reflect on 2023 it is difficult not to believe that bad angels have succeeded in penetrating our world. Wars increase and famines threaten, migration continues to unsettle the settled, and as our physical environment becomes more poisonous, the development of humanity’s moral and spiritual capacities seems to be stalled. Familiar ancient and primitive fears and desires continue to determine the actions and reactions of individuals and governments.
Just eight days ago was born the one who, according to other traditions, brought an end to the reign of all “ghosties and ghoulies and long legged beasties”. For as Wisdom 18.14-15 notes: “While gentle silence enveloped all things, your all-powerful word leapt from heaven into the midst of the land that was doomed.” Even though that Word now incarnate is described as “a stern warrior who brings death”, it is only the death of everything opposed to God’s authentic command. The sword that he wields is the double-edged sword of the Word of God: on one side justice, integrity and truth; on the other side mercy, compassion and love.
The drama of humanity and of our world is played out most profoundly in the life, teaching, death and resurrection of this Child. He is the Lamb standing silently and gently at the centre of all apocalyptic visions. He is the Lamb led to the slaughter in order to bear our infirmities and carry our diseases. Slain from before the foundation of the world, he is the only one who can open the final seal, embrace all the world’s sadness and suffering, bring healing and new life even to desert places where hope has died and the evil ones reign. That’s why our celebration continues as the secular world returns to its familiar routines, intractable problems and comforting distractions. For Christians there is another great feast yet to come, the day of Epiphany, sealing our faith in the universality of the Child’s mission.
Today is the day of the maids a-milking, a gentle activity, though presumably accompanied by grunts and groans from the cows being a-milked. In Christian tradition it is the day of the Eight Beatitudes, the true transvaluation of values to which Jesus calls his disciples: to live in this world in vulnerability, gentleness and joy. It is paradoxical by the standards of the world but it is the way to live the life of God who is Love. Who knows it better, who shows it better, than Mary, who in her Motherhood, celebrated today, nourishes the whole Church with the milk of her Son’s teaching.
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