Christmas Midnight Mass 2020
Isaiah 9:2-7; Titus 2:11-14; Luke 2:1-14
Isn’t this the strangest Midnight Mass ever? Over the years, I have attended and celebrated Midnight Mass in many different settings, firstly in my home parish as a lad and a young man, and then, after ordination, in locations near and far, in buildings grand or makeshift, in parishes urban and rural.
For two of the first three Christmases after ordination, I drove for miles to Overton, at the mouth of the Lune, finally crossing a cattle grid and celebrating Mass in a wooden hut, where the crib was constructed out of bales of hay from the farm next door. I have offered an early Mass at St. Thomas More’s, on the Marsh, in the shadow of the long derelict Williamson’s lino works, before returning to the splendour of Lancaster Cathedral , with the Bishop presiding over a magnificent liturgy with a choir to die for, and servers at the peak of their form.
Yet never have I, or you, welcomed the Christ child with a masked congregation, socially distanced, forbidden to sing—or even to exchange the customary greetings—before returning home for what will be, for some, a solitary day, or at least a day with fewer people gathered than usual, where some will be anxious or grieving over sick or deceased relatives.
Please God, this situation will pass before too long, and will not be repeated, but perhaps it may encourage us to think about, and to pray for, those many people throughout the world whose Christmas will be even starker and more difficult than ours.
There are the many who are persecuted, and who are rarely, if ever, able to practise their faith openly. There are others who live under tyrannical regimes, or in abusive situations closer to home. There are refugees huddled in camps or detention centres; the hungry, the homeless, the sick, the bereaved, prisoners (including many who are unjustly imprisoned), those in care homes, and those whose work keeps them from home. Let us remember too those millions to whom the birth of the Saviour conveys no meaning.
The first Christmas was a fairly bleak and lonely affair, celebrated by a husband and wife, with a newborn child, a handful of strangers, and the odd farm animal, yet it was an event which has changed history and reverberated though the millennia. May our celebration of this most unusual Christmas, which at least demonstrates our faithfulness, play its own part in the redemption and renewal of the world; and may the joy of Christmas transform your hearts and the heart of that same world.
