Hrizostom: Let Christmas be a Christmas of open doors and open hearts

(Patria) - Metropolitan Hrizostom of Dabar-Bosna reminded in his traditional Christmas message that Christmas is a holiday of family and social community, and that the Lord himself showed through his example that divine love must be shared with those near and far.

This love, Hrizostom stated, is not an expressive fiction, but an effective love that acts at all times and in all occasions and circumstances.

- Let Christmas be a Christmas of open doors and open hearts, not only for God, for Christ the Lord, but also for those for whom He himself said – if you received one of these little ones, if you clothed him, if you fed or gave him drink, if you visited him in hospital or visited him in prison, you did all this to Me – asserted the metropolitan.

Hrizostom emphasizes that Christmas is not just a holiday of remembrance, but above all and before all, always and anew, an event in our hearts, in our being, in our Church, our community. Mysteriously, our hearts, our beings, become a place where Jesus Christ constantly and unceasingly dwells. Saint Ignatius of Antioch, the metropolitan emphasizes, was named so because he constantly carried God in his heart.

The Metropolitan of Dabar-Bosna reminds that, unfortunately, we live in a time of humanitarian catastrophe unprecedented and unheard of in history.

- They tell us and convince us that we know nothing, but also that we do not try to learn anything about this scourge of the pandemic, let alone talk about it. As if the "experts, who admit they know nothing," are telling us: your only job is to die! Well, we cannot accept such dehumanization of society and the world. Precisely, in the name of the holiday of the Birth of the Lord Jesus Christ, by which God made us His children and honored us with the Life of the Living God Himself, we cannot accept such an attitude towards Man – the greatest good after God. In the name of God and in the name of true humanism, we call on scientists and encourage them to reveal to us the full scientific truth about COVID-19, to strive to find the best and safest medicines and preventive measures against this pan-killer – asserted Hrizostom.

He concluded the Christmas greeting with wishes for a happy and blessed Christmas with the joyful greeting "Peace of God – Christ is born".