From Nothing, All
From Nothing, All
In the beginning was the Word.
ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος.
Logos, transcendent Wisdom and Word who order all things, you have become flesh and dwelt among us.
By your voice, Logos, all things were created, and yet you were born a speechless baby, in a cave filled with speechless beasts.
But though there was neither speech nor language, your voice was always and already heard; your sound is gone out into all lands, your words into the ends of the world. The Greek philosophers recognised your wisdom, the Persian Magi your light, the Indian sages the way you made yourself Nothing. The whole world was waiting for you, unaware.
Eternal Light, who appeared to Moses in the wildfire, you have descended into our darkness. Though you were King of Israel, when you were born in Bethlehem, a magician from Persia, a Gentile, saw your star from afar. Though you were without sin, you came among us sinners waiting for baptism by the Jordan, and you were washed with us.
King of the nations, the cornerstone that gives salvation, descending for the Gentiles and sinners, you ate with us tax collectors, prostitutes and sinners, and became our servant. You called us 'friends'.
You made your enemies friends. You came as light to S Paul, who persecuted the Church, and made him a leader of the Church. Help us, too, to forgive our enemies. Shine your light on us. Make us, Gentiles, sinners and persecutors, your friends, too.
Logos, who in the beginning were with God, and in the beginning were God, and gave life to the world, you did not cling to equality with God, but to save us whom you made from nothing, you made yourself nothing.
Root of Jesse, who silenced the kings of the nations, you could have commanded the armies of heaven, but like a lamb drawn to the slaughter, like a ewe that is silent before her shearers, you did not open your mouth. Lamb of God, you were pierced for the transgressions of the wandering flock.
Key of David, who open the gates of heaven, King of heaven, who gives eternal life, you poured out your life unto death and descended into hell, breaking its gates and setting free the souls of the dead. Risen, you lifted up our flesh into your Kingdom.
Lord, who said, "I am the life," and made everything out of nothing, who were born of the nothing in the womb of the Virgin Mary, who descended to the nothingness of Hell, who rose from the nothingness of the Tomb, who made Yourself nothing, you gave us who walk through the valley of the shadow of death the fulness of Your life.
Out of the nothingness of silence the peoples of the nations have heard your word.
Out of the nothingness of darkness, the nations have seen your light.
Out of the nothingness of Hell, the nations received your life.
On this feast of the Holy Nativity, wherever we have sen your light, whether we are Greeks, Persians, British or Japanese, your light does not extinguish that light we have seen, but makes it perfect. For the light that the peoples of the nations have seen, you have perfectly revealed – as love. So, in the face of the sick, the poor, the foreigner, the refugee, the sinner, you are always with us, Emmanuel. In human form, you invite us to eternal love.
But now, Lord Logos, at today's Feast of the Nativity, as you once became flesh in Bethlehem, come and dwell among us as bread at the altar. As you were born in the silence and darkness of the cave, be born in the cave of our hearts. And let there be light!
Christus natus est!
Alleluia!