"In Christ's human life there were always a few who made up for the neglect of the crowd.The shepherds saw their king...in a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes laying in a manger. The kings saw what this little one would mean to the world. They brought gifts of greatness to atone for the pain and agony to come. Many did what they could in the time of Christ to serve a man that would pay the ultimate sacrifice for us all.
The shepherds did it, their hurrying to the crib atoned for the people who would flee from Christ.
The wise men did it; their journey across the world made up for those who refused to stir one hand's breadth from the routine of their lives to go to Christ. Even the gifts that the wise men brought have in themselves an obscure recompense and atonement for what would follow later in this Child's life. For they brought gold, the king's emblem, to make up for the crown of thorns that He would wear; they offered incense, the symbol of praise, to make up for the mockery and the spitting; they gave Him myrrh, to heal and soothe, and He was wounded from head to foot and no one bathed his wounds. The women at the foot of the cross did it too, making up for the crowd who stood by and sneered.
We can do it too, exactly as they did. We are not born too late. We do it by seeing Christ and serving Christ in friends and strangers, in everyone we come in contact with. While almost no one is unable to give some hospitality or help to others, those for whom it is really impossible are not debarred from giving room to Christ, because, to take the simplest of examples, in those they live with or work with is Christ disguised. All our life is bound up with other people; for almost all of us happiness and unhappiness are conditioned by our relationship with other people. What a simplification of life it would be if we forced ourselves to see that everywhere we go is Christ, wearing out socks we have to darn, eating the food we have to cook, laughing with us, silent with us, sleeping with us."
But what does that mean for us, millenia removed from the time of Christ? What can we do for a man far out of our reach? We can extend a hand of kindness and help. Christ is all around us, though we may not recognize Him at first...There is an image that portrays this that I have always loved: "Jesus of the Breadline".
So what can we do? What are we being called to do? We are called to see Christ in everyone: in friends, in the new person sitting in the pews, the person that cuts you off at the supermarket, the man who sits along the sidewalk asking for a quarter. Christ ascended from earth but did not leave us behind. He asked that we be His hands and feet offering love and respect to those we meet.
We are only a few days into the new year, and many of our resolutions may already be broken. Resolve to make change, to be the face of Christ...to see Him in your world, in everyone you meet.
Quote taken from: Day, Dorothy. "Room For Christ". The Catholic Worker, December 1945, 2. The Catholic Worker Movement. http://www.catholicworker.org/dorothyday/Reprint2.cfm?TextID=416.
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