Baby Jesus Sleeping on a Cross

This short email undoubtedly trails behind all the other more timely emails that you have received from more organized outfits wishing you a Merry Christmas. It’s virtually impossible for the two of us to keep up with the interminable pace of the digital calendar, which in some ways has overcome the timelessness of our liturgical calendar. But, aside from that fact, we simply never plan to prioritize time-pressured communication over meaningful missives. (You can quote us on that!)

Despite the relative lack of digital evidence, however, we promise that we have been carrying all of you in our hearts to every Mass we have attended this Advent and Christmas season.

On Christmas day, we attended Pope Francis’ Urbi et Orbi address and blessing and then walked through the Holy Door for the Jubilee Year of Hope. We find special meaning for our mission in this jubilee’s theme. As Pope Francis said in his Christmas homily, “Hope calls us—as Saint Augustine would say—to be upset with things that are wrong and to find the courage to change them.” So in hope, we walked through the jubilee door at St. Peter’s Basilica. Then, on the first day of this new year, we walked through one of the other three holy doors open for pilgrims in Rome at the Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major.

The Holy Door at Saint Peter’s Basilica

The Holy Door at Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major

As we walked through these holy doors, reminders that Jesus is the door of salvation (see John 10:9), we prayed for all of you—especially those of you who have been wounded or abused by members of the Church. We also brought with us all that we have been learning in our Safeguarding course and all of the intentions that you all have shared with us.

We especially carried in our hearts the victims of abuse who have shared with us that they can no longer attend Mass because of the trauma they’ve experienced.

As we enter this New Year, many of you already are enduring heavy crosses—or perhaps you will face a suffering this year that you cannot yet imagine. As our Christmas and New Year’s gift to you, we’d like to share an image that has given us consolation. The drawing below, by Sr. Danielle Victoria, is based on several paintings from the 17th century that depict the Infant Jesus sleeping peacefully on a cross—and, in some cases, with a skull. For us, this image of the Child Jesus sleeping peacefully, even as death awaits, captures the complexity and paradox of our faith.

For so many, our experience of faith is inextricably bound up in suffering—especially if you have experienced hurt or abuse in the Church. For this reason, we find solace in this image of the Baby Jesus. It’s not just light and happy; it’s complex—like our faith. It also reminds us that Christ did not bypass our suffering, he entered directly into it.

Thus, in faith, we continue to find Hope in the Child Jesus who was born to die for us—born to conquer Death.