20 December, Antonio, Cardinal Bacci: Meditations For Each Day

A CHRISTMAS NOVENA

V. The Swaddling Clothes of the Divine Infant

1. It is believed that Mary, like other mothers in those days, wrapped the Infant Jesus in swaddling clothes. The Divine Child quietly offered this new humiliation to His heavenly Father. He saw prefigured in these bands the ropes with which He would be bound in the garden of Gethsemane, even after He had given sinful humanity His celestial teaching, example and miracles, and finally His own Body in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. He saw in them, too, the chains with which He would be secured to the pillar in order to be scourged in the Praetorium of Pilate among the jeers and insults of the onlookers. He saw in them, finally, the cords with which, after having been condemned to the ignominious death of the Cross, He would be tied while being led to the place of execution on Mount Calvary. Filled with infinite love for stricken humanity, the Heart of the Divine Infant offered all this in advance to His Father in Heaven.

Are we making any effort to return such great love? Like Jesus, we are often obliged to endure both physical and moral anguish. Have we the resignation to offer it all to Jesus, or do we squander our opportunities in useless complaining or in acts of impatience and rebellion? We shall have to go on suffering anyway, but in the latter case we may have to suffer even more and shall lose all merit in the sight of God.

Let us kneel down before the Holy Infant wrapped in His swaddling clothes, and let us promise to endure everything for His sake and in reparation for our sins.

2. The swaddling clothes of the Infant Jesus are, moreover, a symbol of the love which should bind us to Him. If we are not capable of loving Jesus, are we capable of love at all? Perhaps we love wealth, honour and pleasure? Some day, however, we shall have to leave all our wealth behind. Worldly honour and glory are also fleeting and can never satisfy us, while earthly pleasures leave behind a sense of emptiness and disgust. Jesus Christ alone can satisfy our hearts, for He alone has words of everlasting life. “Lord,” let us say with St. Peter, “to whom shall we go? Thou hast words of everlasting life.” (John 6:69)

3. The swaddling clothes of the Infant Jesus are, finally, symbolic of the bonds of love which should unite us to our neighbour. Let us always remember that we shall never love God sincerely as long as we do not love our neighbour. “This is my commandment,” Jesus said, “that you love one another as I have loved you.” (John 15:12) This means that we must love our neighbour not only in word but in deed. We must make sacrifices on his behalf and must even be prepared to die for him.

In practice, how do we love our fellow-men? Are we prepared to spend time, money and energy in order to alleviate the material and spiritual afflictions which beset so many of our brothers? If we refuse to do so, our piety is hard and false and is an insult to Almighty God.