CELEBRATING CHRISTMAS?

Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people, and to remember what other people have done for you? To ignore what the world owes you, and to think what you owe the world? To put your rights in the background, your duties in the middle distance, and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground? To see that your fellow men are just as real as you are, and try to look behind their faces into their hearts - hungry for joy and understanding; to acknowledge that probably the only good reason for your existence is not what you are going to get out of life, but what you are going to give to life; to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe, and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness. Are you willing to do these things even for a day? THEN you may celebrate Christmas! Are you willing to believe that love is the strongest force in the world - stronger than hate, stronger than evil, stronger than death - and that the blessed Life that began in Bethlehem more than 2 000 years ago is the image and brightness of Love Eternal? The love of God, the Father, Jesus, the Son and the blessed Holy Spirit. THEN you may celebrate Christmas! And if you celebrate it for one day, why not each and every day of your life? - Selected