“Do not be afraid; for behold I proclaim to
you good news of great joy … today in the city of David
a Savior is born for you” (Lk 2:10-11). The message of
Christ’s coming, brought from heaven by the voice of
angels, continues to echo in this town, just as it
echoes in families, homes and communities throughout the
world. It is “good news”, the angels say “for all the
people”. It proclaims that the Messiah, the Son of God
and the Son of David, has been born “for you”: for you
and me, and for men and women in every time and place.
In God’s plan, Bethlehem, “least among the clans of
Judah” (Mic 5:2), has become a place of undying glory:
the place where, in the fullness of time, God chose to
become man, to end the long reign of sin and death, and
to bring new and abundant life to a world which had
grown old, weary and oppressed by hopelessness.
For
men and women everywhere, Bethlehem is associated with this
joyful message of rebirth, renewal, light and freedom. Yet here,
in our midst, how far this magnificent promise seems from being
realized! How distant seems that Kingdom of wide dominion and
peace, security, justice and integrity which the Prophet Isaiah
heralded in the first reading (cf. Is 9:7), and which we
proclaim as definitively established in the coming of Jesus
Christ, Messiah and King!
Pope Benedict XVI’s Homily at Mass in Manger Square
Wednesday, 13 May 2009, city of Bethlehem
Excerpts taken from the LP website,
www.lpj.org
“The whole world is preparing to celebrate Christmas.
Yet no place on earth is as special as Bethlehem, the
Palestinian city that was blessed and chosen by God to
be the birthplace of the messenger of peace and love,
that great event that marked the beginning of the
Christian era.”
Yasser Arafat Gaza,
August 1998
Quoted in Bethlehem 2000, c. 1998 by Mitri
Raheb