Strive to give “dignity to work”, also avoiding the very serious plague of the so-called “white deaths”. The homily of Pope Francis in the Christmas Eve Mass, celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica in front of about 1,500 people, also this year brought forward at 7.30 pm as it was last year at the time of the curfew, does not neglect highly topical issues. anti-Covid. For the Pontiff it is necessary to recognize that the message of Christmas “does not ride greatness, but descends into the littleness” of the God-child who comes into the world. And therefore “embrace Jesus in the little ones of today”, the least, the poor, putting aside contempt and indifference.
The way of littleness
For the Pontiff, “the challenge of Christmas” is, looking at the nativity scene, knowing how to welcome and understand “the way of littleness”. Because «God reveals himself, but men do not understand him. He makes himself small in the eyes of the world and we continue to seek greatness according to the world, perhaps even in his name. God lowers himself and we want to get on the pedestal. The Most High indicates humility and we pretend to appear. God goes in search of shepherds, of the invisible; we seek visibility. Jesus was born to serve and we spend the years chasing success ».
“God does not seek strength and power – warns Francis -, he asks for tenderness and interior littleness”. Here then is “what to ask of Jesus for Christmas: the grace of littleness”. Because, according to the Pope, “it is a message of great hope: Jesus invites us to value and rediscover the little things in life”.
Do not despise the poor with indifference
“So let’s leave behind the regrets for the greatness we don’t have. Let us renounce complaints and long faces, greed that leaves us unsatisfied! », The Pontiff warns. But “welcoming smallness” also means “loving Jesus in the least, serving him in the poor”. «They are the most similar to Jesus, born poor – recalls Bergoglio -. And it is in them that He wants to be honored. In this night of love a single fear assails us: to hurt the love of God, to hurt it by despising the poor with our indifference ”.
The Pope goes even further, because always looking at the crib he sees the shepherds as “the forgotten of the peripheries”, people whose “dignity is put to the test”. In short, Jesus “comes to ennoble the excluded and reveals himself above all to them: not to educated and important people, but to poor people who worked”.