Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord
December 25, 2020
Daily reading from the USCCB: Isaiah 9:1-6
This midnight reading is a proclamation of hope. It announces the coming of an ideal king. He will bring light and joy and fulfillment and justice and peace.
We Christians believe that the figure that Isaiah announced was Jesus, the Christ. His birth in the middle of the night was the beginning of a new day–a burst of light in the darkness.
This reading was originally intended to bring encouragement to the people of a nation tiny even by the standards of the eighth century B.C. What it seemed to promise to its first hearers never really came to pass. Yet we still read Isaiah’s words with gratitude because we know that they are addressed to us today, and God’s words are never spoken in vain.
