Homily preached by the Rev. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Ph.D., S.T.D., at the Third Mass of Christmas on the Solemnity of
the Lord's Nativity, 2011, at the Church of the Holy Innocents in Manhattan.
Laudetur Jesus Christus. Sia lodato Gesù Cristo. Garbe Jezui Kristui. Slava Isusu Kristu. Praised be Jesus
Christ. “Vere dignum et justum est.” Yes, how right it is to praise the Lord and Messiah in every tongue known to man,
especially on this day referred to by St. Paul as “when the time had fully come” (Gal 4:4), that time when God made a
unity of the entire human race. This day was no accident, no coincident; it was planned for from all eternity; indeed, it
represented precisely what the Epistle to the Ephesians called it: plenitudo temporis (the fullness of time), that is, that
moment when the aspirations and yearnings of all humanity had reached an apex and it seemed that all men were
chafing at the bit for some kind of definitive intervention to occur within human affairs.
The three great civilizations of Jerusalem, Athens and Rome – each in its own way – participated in this
experience.
Plenitudo temporis. Israel's prophets from Isaiah, to Micah, to Malachi had prepared the minds and hearts of
the Chosen People for an encounter with one born of a virgin in the backwater town of Bethlehem; one who would
return mankind to the Garden of Eden; one who would inaugurate a reign of universal justice and peace, harmony and
wholeness. The sages who were the human instruments for God's Revelation in the Wisdom Literature taught mighty
truths: “I came forth from the mouth of the Most High. . . . Then the Creator of all things. . . said, ‘Make your dwelling in
Jacob, and in Israel receive your inheritance.’ . . . So I took root in an honored people, in the portion of the Lord, who
is their inheritance” [Sir 24:3, 8, 12]. Or the line which gives such meaning to Midnight Mass: “For while gentle silence
enveloped all things, and night in its swift course was now half gone, thy all-powerful word leaped from heaven, from the
royal throne” [Wis 18:14-15]. Beyond all the scriptural data, we also discover the time as one replete with reform
movements within Judaism, signs of hope and promise, so that the Pharisees embarked on a lay-led effort to purify their
religion and to teach with certitude about the resurrection of the dead, while the Essenes hied themselves out to the
desert to prepare for the Messiah's coming. Individuals also partook of this messianic anticipation, with someone like
the old priest Zechariah looking into his baby boy's face and seeing therein the one who would be the Lord's precursor.
Plenitudo temporis. But such hopes were not limited to Abraham's stock as the culture of Athens made its unique
contribution. Greek philosophy began to look askance at the Pantheon; the great lights from Socrates to Aristotle
looked to one God, and that reflection even led them to identify Him with the Logos, the Word Who was this self-same
God before time began, about whom we sang in this morning’s Gospel. Was it mere chance that the Jews also spoke
about God's Word being uttered and coming down among us? Indeed, the combination of the Greek and Hebrew
concepts here offer us the image of One Who is: God's own dynamic, creative Word; the personified Wisdom of
Divinity; the ultimate Source of intelligibility for the entire cosmos.
Plenitudo temporis. God also used the power, organization, language, network and empire of ancient Rome for
His purposes. The same attitude of expectancy we have found in Jerusalem and Athens was likewise here, and really in
some rather eerie and uncanny ways. The great pagan poet Virgil, decades before Christ and thousands of miles
away, in his Fourth Eclogue sings thus: “Now is come the last age of the song of Cumae; the great line of the centuries
begins anew. Now the Virgin returns, the reign of Saturn returns; now a new generation descends from heaven on
high.” He goes on to speak of the birth of a child whose coming will bring universal peace and a golden age in which
sin and guilt will be wiped away. Speaking to this child, old Virgil predicts his victory over the serpent, and then, in great
tenderness, he addresses the little one: “Incipe, parve puer, risu cognoscere matrem” [Begin, O baby boy, to recognize
your mother by her smile].
No wonder that the medievals took the unprecedented step of declaring Virgil a saint by popular acclamation.
But Virgil was not alone in his posture of waiting; Caesar Augustus was also within those ranks. It seems that the great
Emperor of the “Pax Romana” one day ascended the Capitoline Hill to obtain an augury from the Sibylline prophetess
over the Temple of Jupiter – but an augury he did not expect or desire. Her examination of the entrails of his sacrifice
made her shriek in horror as she pointed out toward the eastern limits of his empire, exclaiming: “At this very moment in
the east, there is being born a child who will rule in your place over the whole world from this very spot where we
stand.” In truth, God had used a pagan soothsayer to proclaim the Gospel to the man who ruled the world – or at least
thought he did. On that hill, from at least the sixth century forward, has stood the Church of Santa Maria in Aracoeli.
So significant is that site that even the virulent anti-Catholic historian Edward Gibbon tells us: “It was at Rome, on the
15th of October, 1764, as I sat musing amidst the ruins of the Capitol, while the barefoot friars were singing Vespers in
the Temple of Jupiter, that the idea of writing the decline and fall of the city first started to my mind.”
Edgar Allen Poe spoke of “the glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome.” The emphasis must
obviously be placed on the past tense of those verbs – “was.” The holy prophets and sages of Israel; the philosophers
of Greece; the poets, priestesses and princes of Rome; all looked for and participated in fashioning the plenitudo
temporis.
And for nearly two millennia people have continued to desire and to seek the One Who not only brings the
plenitudo temporis, but is its very Embodiment, literally. That reflection, that search, that aspiration is not enough; one
must know where and how such dreams may be fulfilled. In the last century, the great English convert, G. K.
Chesterton, gave us the ticket with his poem, “The House of Christmas.” Analyzing the human condition of restlessness
and hopelessness, he declares – without fear of contradiction – “For men are homesick in their homes, And strangers
under the sun.” We need a place to feel “at home,” and Chesterton tells us that such a place is provided for us only in
and through Jesus Christ; with the rhapsody of a poet and the insight of a philosopher-theologian, he writes:
To an open house in the evening
Home shall men come,
To an older place than Eden
And a taller town than Rome.
To the end of the way of the wandering star,
To the things that cannot be and that are,
To the place where God was homeless
And all men are at home.
The solution, according to the poet, is to make ourselves homeless if we want to inherit a real and everlasting
home. So, whether someone owns a Brownstone, rents a cold-water flat or lives on a bench in Bryant Park, all of us
must make ourselves homeless by divesting ourselves of worldly drives for power, prestige and the almighty dollar. But
there is more stripping away that must be done – and perhaps this is a bit more difficult. We must lay aside any and all
sins which place gods other than the Christ Child in the manger: sins of greed, insensitivity to the poor, the stranger
and the immigrant; sins of fornication, adultery, abortion, and artificial contraception; sins of laziness which keep all too
many away from Christ, His Church and the sacraments for weeks and even months or years on end.
So, my dear people, the plenitudo temporis has been in our midst for 2000 years, and yet so many of us have
failed to experience it. As Our Lord said to His hearers, “many prophets and righteous men longed to see what you
see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it” [Mt 13:18]. If we haven't known its meaning and
power personally, when will we? Not unless and until we follow the example of the Lord Jesus Himself by emptying
ourselves of all disordered dreams and desires and then allow Him to fill us – not with superficial things which are bound
to frustrate – but with His life, His truth, His love.
Permit me to make a suggestion. Give yourself a Christmas gift this year – the gift of spiritual homelessness, so
that God can give you a home – that place which is “older. . . than Eden. And a taller town than Rome.” It is the home
of eternity, which no one can rob, which no human weakness can disappoint. It is the home given us by a homeless
and helpless Babe Who is, against all odds and all appearances, the “Desired of the nations,” the One in Whom the
cultures of Jerusalem, Athens and Rome found their fulfillment – and yes, the culture of New York as well. Jesus,
coming to us in the plenitudo temporis, leads us “to the place where [He] was homeless And all men are at home.” That
place is this altar where He makes Himself as present to us as He was to His Blessed Mother, and that altar is the
touchstone of eternity for us and for all who wish to know not just “the fullness of time” but also the fullness of eternity.