Author Topic: Merry Christmas! (Read 2105 times)

Viva Cristo Rey · « **on:** December 21, 2015, 10:14:14 PM »

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Cantarella · « **Reply #1 on:** December 22, 2015, 12:35:04 AM »

Merry Christmas!

Croagh Patrick · « **Reply #2 on:** December 22, 2015, 05:17:39 AM »

"Nollaig Shona Daoibh"
(NO-Lihg HO-nuh JEEV)
This literally means "You have a Happy Christmas."

“With ivy, shamrock and bright holly berry, be Christmas to you both blessed and merry!”

http://www.contactnumbers.co.in/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Christmas-Crib.jpg

cassini · « **Reply #3 on:** December 22, 2015, 07:08:35 AM »

Quote from: Viva Cristo Rey

Merry Christmas to everyone!

And the same to you and all.

‘The Lord hath said to me: Thou art my son,
this day have I begotten thee.’ (Ps 2:7) and (Heb 5:5-6)

As we know, Christians celebrate the birth of Christ on the 25th December, a fixed 24-hour day set in the calendar, ‘whilst the whole liturgical Cycle has, every year, to be changed and remodelled to yield that ever varying day, which is to be the feast of the Resurrection.’ [Abbot Guéranger, O.S.B: The Liturgical Year, St Bonaventure Publications, p6.] Abbot Guéranger goes on to say the four weeks of our preparation in Advent before they reach the 25th day of the month of December are in the image of the four thousand years that preceded the great coming of Christ (from Creation to Christ). According to a sacred tradition, the creation of man took place on a Friday; the day Christ suffered death on the Cross to redeem mankind. He chose to rise from the dead after ‘three’ days, a Sunday, the day light was created, visible on earth.
Christmas day however, is different to others, it falling on all the days of the week in turn so that its holiness may ‘cleanse and rid them of the curse that Adam’s sin had put upon them.’ This of course applies to the whole universe, which, as St Paul told us, was also affected by Original Sin. ‘This day is referenced not to the divisions of time marked out by God himself, which is called a week, but to the course of that great luminary that gives light to the world, because it gives light and warmth. Jesus our Saviour, the Light of the World, was born when the night of the idolatry and crime [in the world] was at its darkest; and the day of His birth, the 25th December, is that on which the material sun begins to gain his ascendancy over the reign of gloomy night, and show the world His triumph of brightness.’

“On this Day which the Lord had made,’ says St Gregory of Nyssa, ‘darkness decreases and light increases, and Night is driven back again. No, brethren, it is not by chance, nor by any created will, that this natural change begins on the day when he shows himself in the brightness of his coming, which is the spiritual Life of the world. .. Nature seems to me to say; Know, O Man, that under the things which I show thee Mysteries lie concealed. Hast thou not seen the night, that had grown so long, suddenly checked? --- Abbot Guéranger, The Liturgical Year.

St Augustine said ‘The day he chose was that on which the light begins to increase, it typifies the work of Christ, who renews our interior man day by day. For the eternal Creator having willed to be born in time, his Birthday would necessarily be in harmony with the rest of creation.’ Guéranger then addresses those who dare scoff at the divine plan as having its origin in the Pagan feast of the sun on the winter solstice that occurs days earlier, on Dec. 21/22. ‘In their shallow erudition they conclude that a Religion could not be divinely instituted, which has certain rites or customs originating in an analogy to certain phenomena of this world; they deny what Revelation asserts, namely, that God only created the world for the sake of his Christ and his Church.’
--- T.E.

McFiggly · « **Reply #4 on:** December 22, 2015, 08:14:24 AM »

Merry Christmas

RomanCatholic1953 · « **Reply #5 on:** December 22, 2015, 08:53:56 AM »

This is a photo of a live Nativity display in Chicago, Illinois in the 1950's.

The players were recent immigrants to the U.S. At that time, many of

the immigrants were coming from Eastern Europe.

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL.

Stubborn · « **Reply #6 on:** December 22, 2015, 12:51:37 PM »

Gloria in Excelsis Deo!

Hail and blessed be the hour and moment in which the Son of God was born of the
most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold.

Merry Christmas!

poche · « **Reply #7 on:** December 23, 2015, 10:55:40 PM »

Merry Christmas to everyone also.
:farmer: :farmer: :farmer:

Cantarella · « **Reply #8 on:** December 24, 2015, 11:40:51 AM »

A forgotten tradition: the fasting day before Christmas.

Until 1958, Catholics generally fasted on December 24; it was a one-day fast in preparation for Christmas. It had remained even as various customs of fasting and / or abstinence on some days of Advent vanished through the centuries.

In 1959, Pope John XXIII permitted (but did not require) the fast to be moved to December 23. Even before 1959 some countries already had this permission. Pope John XXIII made it universal.

The obligation to fast on either December 23 or December 24 was removed by the Apostolic Constitution "Paenitemini" (1966).

Nevertheless there is nothing wrong in voluntarily observing this one day of fasting, especially as an act of prayer and penance in the middle of the extreme worldliness of contemporary Christmas celebrations.

HiddenServant · « **Reply #9 on:** December 24, 2015, 12:56:32 PM »

I posted pictures with Merry Christmas. It is in my Christmas section of photo's.

Viva Cristo Rey · « **Reply #10 on:** December 24, 2015, 09:06:42 PM »

Merry Christmas!

JPaul · « **Reply #11 on:** December 24, 2015, 09:39:24 PM »

For the sake of He Who has known us from all eternity, and Who comes to us today,
May He bless you all my brethren, and save you in eternity.

A Merry and Holy forty days of Christmas to you all!

jp

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #12 on:** December 25, 2015, 12:13:10 AM »

.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

.

Tyler · « **Reply #13 on:** December 25, 2015, 02:58:58 AM »

Gaudete, gaudete, Christus est natus ex Maria virgine, gaudete!

2Vermont · « **Reply #14 on:** December 25, 2015, 07:56:16 AM »

Merry Christmas!