By: Postulant Jordan
Since entering the convent in July, I have had the opportunity to assist in the 5 year old classroom of our Carmelite Child Development Center. One highlight from the past six months of working with these kids has been helping to prepare them for their annual Christmas pageant. The 5 year old Christmas pageant is not unlike many Christmas pageants going on at schools around the country: a narrator reads the story of Jesus’ birth, and children dressed as Mary, Joseph, Angels, and Magi parade around the stage as their parents eagerly try to snap a photo. However, I found that the weeks leading up to the pageant were even more rewarding than seeing the final production. In addition to teaching the children where to stand and how to sing verses of “Silent Night”, great care was taken to instill in the children the actual meaning of Christmas for us as Christians. One sweet girl in our class was assigned the role of “Star” in the Christmas pageant, meaning that she got to stand in a prominent place on stage above Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus and the rest of the children on stage would point to her as they sang the lyrics “Star of wonder, star of night, star of royal beauty bright” during the song “We Three Kings”. Despite her normally very mature demeanor, during practice (as everyone pointed at her), she lapsed into a silly mood, pretending to examine her pockets or anything else despite holding her start proudly above her head. I took her aside at the first chance I had, hoping to boost her confidence and remind her that her role was important, so I asked her “Cecelia, what are you in the Christmas pageant?”
“The star,” she replied with a smile.
Instead of then telling her what I thought the importance of the star was, I simply asked her, “And what is the job of the star?”
“To lead people to Jesus,” she said, very matter-of-factly. I was blown away. After we mutually established that the star would proudly shine in the sky (or on stage) and not try to hide as people looked at it, I let her go, and I was left to reflect on our conversation. In none of the religion lessons or explanations given to the children did anyone ever say that the star leads people to Jesus, and yet, young Cecelia intuitively knew it. Upon further reflection, I realized that we are all called to live our lives boldly in a way that leads people to Jesus. Whether it is something as small as holding the door for someone and smiling, or having an intentional conversation with someone about your faith and calling them to deepen their own, we are all called to bring souls closer to Jesus through our own lives.
In the gospel reading for Epiphany Sunday, it says that after the magi journeyed and reached the place that the star had stopped where the child was, “they were overjoyed at seeing the star.” The light of the star that they had been following finally led them to the dwelling place of the Holy Family, but before they even entered the house to see the Christ Child, the star caused them to be overjoyed. As we wrap up this Christmas season and head into the year 2020 at full speed, may we all stop to consider how to let the light of Christ illumine our hearts even brighter so that we can be the star to all those we encounter.
In the words of Benedict XVI: Man's true constellations are those men who show him the new path of his heart and his vocation. Christ is the star that has risen for us. In faith, he himself kindles for us the light that makes other men stars who show the way to him...This makes Christmas a very practical matter. To look at the star means receiving light and giving light, radiating in the world around us the light that we have received, so that it can provide orientation to others, too. We have more than enough opportunities to do this, even outside Advent: once our heart has awakened, we see around us so many others who are waiting for a light. Let them not call out to us in vain. (Ratzinger, The Blessing of Christmas, 96)