News Item: : Christmas Evangelization from the Domestic Church
(Category: Torch of The Faith News)
Posted by admin
Friday 30 December 2016 - 14:22:27

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'Twas the night before Christmas: Angeline completing the finishing touches to our window crib-scene just before Christmas Eve.

The various feasts and seasons of the Liturgical Calendar provide many splendid opportunities for evangelization to shine out from the domestic church. Such opportunities become ever more important as atheistic secularization continues apace in the wider society.

As I've noted before, my late father Ken used to make special posters to hang in the windows at Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter; as well as sending out religious cards to friends and neighbours with a brief Christian message, and the times of confessions and Masses at local churches, listed inside them.

Throughout the year, he also had a 10-inch tall Crucifix in the front window, which was replaced by a lovingly created Nativity scene each Christmas. 

This Nativity was particularly notable because, except for the grounds and interiors of churches, it is very rare to see Christmas Nativity scenes in England these days. There may be plenty of houses adorned with illuminated Santas, reindeer and snowmen, but there are not so many featuring representations of the Holy Family.

In fact, due to their scarcity in British shops, Dad had to make his own using statues of Our Lady of Lourdes, St. Joseph the Worker and a plastic baby laid in a potpourri basket!

Perhaps it was just a Steubenville thing, but when Angie and I spent two years in America, it was wonderful for us to see Christmas Crib sets lit-up on the porches, window ledges and lawns of so many homes at this time of year.

I managed to pick up a Nativity set, at a garage sale in Ohio, during our first semester for just 50 cents. We were then able to set it up on the snow-covered veranda of our apartment during the holy season.

Although it cost us many times that to have the set boxed and shipped back to England two years later - and though it took four weeks longer than we did to come home across the Atlantic! - we've always considered that it was well worth the outlay and hassle.
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Yet in thy dark streets shineth the everlasting Light. The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.

With a drape of deep blue fabric to represent the night sky, a Christmas tree decoration doubling as the Star of Bethlehem, and a set of warm-white Christmas lights to add a bit of twinkle, we pray that our Nativity set helps to keep the light of Christ shining locally each Christmas.

Above a glowing candle-arch in the front living-room window, we have also erected Dad's last-made Christmas poster; complete with its Nativity icon, silvery background and multi-coloured reminder that God Became Man to Save Us.
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The other front windows include his embossed Nativity window-hanging, which Angeline refreshed last Christmas with a new piece of red and gold tinsel, to keep Dad's legacy of Christian witness fresh for another few years. 
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The final window features the Keep Christ in Christmas poster that we first picked up last year. May God bless Province 21 (Burnley) of the Knights of St. Columba, who were again distributing similar posters to parishes around Lancashire in the weeks prior to Christmas. 
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Familiaris Consortio teaches: ''As a sharer in the mission and life of the Church, which listens to the Word of God with reverence and proclaims it confidently, the Christian family fulfills its prophetic role by welcoming and announcing the Word of God: it thus becomes more and more each day a believing and evangelizing community'' (FC 51).

There are many ways by which the domestic church can act an an engine of Catholic witness and evangelization in its own locality. These are some of the ways that we have inherited and developed; and which we joyfully continue through the various seasons of the Liturgical Calendar. We find them helpful in passing on traditions of faith and family in the home and hopefully beyond.

As the celebrations of the Octave of Christmas continue today, we pray that God will give us all the grace to Keep Christ in Christmas! 



This news item is from Torch of The Faith
( http://www.torchofthefaith.com/news.php?extend.1513 )