The associated reading for this reflection can be found in your Every Sacred Sunday Mass journal or online here.
Welcome appears as a central theme in today’s readings. Isaiah and the Psalmist welcome the Lord in song and joyful proclamation. The author of Hebrews encourages his listeners to welcome the full revelation of God made known in Christ Jesus. St. John tells us that, to those who accept (that is, receive or welcome) Jesus, He gives them power to become children of God, to become members of His Holy Family.
I have been thinking about my own welcome into the Holy Family since this summer when I wrote an icon of the Holy Family in preparation for my wedding. In the icon, the three figures of Mary, Jesus, and Joseph sit at table celebrating Passover. The nearest side of the table in this icon extends outward toward the viewer and remains conspicuously open. The Holy Family has left it open for you—the viewer, the saint-in-making, the pilgrim-in-this-life—as a sign of welcome. The icon is an invitation to accept the Lord and to enter into this Holy Family as brother or sister.
While today’s reading and the solemnity of Christmas point us towards the act of welcoming Jesus into our lives, the icon described above points us to Jesus’s desire to welcome us into His life, His family, His very self. Viewed in light of the Holy Family’s reception of the newborn Christ, the icon helps us glimpse the back-and-forth mystery of our relationship with God. He beckons us to accept Him. We welcome Him in turn. And He responds by beckoning yet again and calling us into ever deeper communion.
The Benedictines have a saying, “When a guest comes, Christ comes.” If, as John says, Christ gives to those who accept Him the power to become children of God, then it would seem that our humble acts of holiday hospitality are actually a supernatural opportunity “to become children of God, adoptive sons, partakers of the divine nature and of eternal life.” (CCC, 1996) To accept our guests as other Christs is to accept into our homes Christ Himself, and to open our table to family and strangers alike is to imitate and extend the invitation of His Holy Family.
In these days, as you welcome guests into your home and accept the welcome of others in return, do not be surprised to see the Lord in your midst. In fact, you might as well expect it. For, when we welcome a guest, we welcome Christ, and we find ourselves at table with God’s Holy Family.
Stephen Barany is a Catholic illustrator living in South Bend, IN where he teaches graphic design at Holy Cross College. You can purchase prints of his work and download free coloring activities for kids from his website.
