Week of December 21, 2008

The Olive Branch	Fr. Seamus Murtagh, Pastor
When Christmas Has No Meaning         A couple of years ago, Christ Fellowship Church in Palm Beach, one of the largest non denominational churches, announced that on Christmas Day there will be no services at all.  Sounds strange, doesn’t it??  NO SERVICES at all on Christmas Day!!  The pastor told his parishioners “Stay at home! Be with your family! You can come for services two days prior to Christmas or two days after Christmas, but on Christmas day itself just be with your family and enjoy the Christmas meal”.          Now, I don’t know if you agree with that decision, but the purpose or motive behind it is commendable, i.e. Christmas is about building family relationships, and if there are no relationships in the family, there is no home. Similarly, if there is a community without fellowship and without outreach, there is no church.          Interestingly, that’s the same message in the first reading.  King David tells Yahweh “I want to build a big temple to you, so that people from all over the world can come and worship! A really big temple, with fine ornaments and architecture!! And guess what Yahweh tells him? “No, I don’t want your temple! Instead, I want you to build the community – the people are divided, segregated, there is discrimination, they are living individualistic lives, they are not yet a community. Build them into a community, and then your son Solomon will build the temple.”  And that was Yahweh’s wish.  Solomon was to build the temple, but David had the task of building relationships.          I believe we can draw a lesson from this story. Christmas will really have no meaning if we celebrate it without any desire of building up relationships or, worse still, if we celebrate it when we have no relationships at all!!  For Christmas to be relevant, there must be relationships so that the celebration can become meaningful.      Christ's Peace,   Rev. Seamus Murtagh, Pastor
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