Emmanuel: Jesus The Light Of All Humankind

Reflection for Christmas Day

Brother Frederick C. Mueller, FSC, Ed.D.

“And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby,
keeping watch over their flocks at night.”
v. 8

Ah! The shepherds appear!  We find them in our crèche scenes, some standing, some kneeling, holding their staves, surrounded by seemingly domesticated sheep.  In Christmas pageants shepherds always make an appearance; they are in all shapes and sizes since it is not a “star” role like that of Mary or Joseph, and there is always room for one more!

But who are these shepherds who play such a prominent role in this Gospel narrative?  Who are these men and women (yes, from ancient writings we know there were women!) who are the first to learn of the birth of the Savior, the Messiah, the Lord?  Later in the Gospel narrative they too are the first to go to the manger, recognize the infant wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger as the long-awaited One revealed to them by the multitude of the heavenly host, and then spread the word concerning what they had seen and heard.  

We know that the shepherds of this time did not have the prestige of the shepherds of the Old Testament: Abraham who shepherded his extended family to a new land heeding God’s call; Moses who shepherded his enslaved people out of Egypt; David, the shepherd boy become king; Amos, the prophet.  In the time of Jesus, the shepherds were not the most well-respected in society; they ranked somewhere with the sinners and tax collectors and prostitutes.  The shepherd was, by their very nature, a vagabond, a wanderer; the shepherd was homeless; the shepherd was a migrant, a migrant worker who went from place to place to find work.   Like David, the shepherd was often the youngest in the family, not yet trustworthy enough to take over the farm.  However, the work of the shepherd was demanding work: knowing his sheep, leading them from pasture to pasture, enduring the elements, staying awake at night to protect the flock from straying off or from thieving marauders or from predatory attacks.  These shepherds to whom the angels appeared and who risked leading their flocks to a manger were men and women who were poor, who were unbathed and smelled of their sheep, who were the underbelly of society, who literally and figuratively stood at the periphery of society.  However, they were awake!

Our Founder, Saint John Baptist de La Salle, in his Meditation for the Nativity (December 25^th) wrote in this way about the shepherds: “Except for these poor shepherds, no one even thought of Jesus when he was born. It even seems that God does not want the rich and the great to find their way to him, for the angel who announces his coming gives the shepherds no other sign to recognize him than the poor and lowly circumstances where they would find him….Why did the shepherds praise and bless God?  Because they had seen a poor Infant lying in a manger and because on seeing him, they had recognized him, thanks to an interior light with which God enlightened them, that this Infant was truly their Savior….”  The Founder concluded this reflection by reminding us that it is only in our own poverty that we can “share in some way in the lowliness of Christ at his birth” and it is only in our own poverty that “the poor come looking for us.”

What then does this mean for me and for you on this Christmas Day 2022?  If we are to be able to recognize Jesus beneath the rags of a poor child, if we are to be open and available to the poor, then we must take on some of the attitudes and ways of the shepherd.  We are challenged to be awake and to stay awake, i.e. to be attentive to our circumstances, in our ministry, and particularly to those whom we serve; to not grow weary in all we face in our lives and in our work.  We are challenged to be free from the constraints of convention, to fight against the accumulation of things that inhibit us from remaining focused, to go wherever we are most needed (and often this is not a physical move but rather a shift in attitude or perspective or attention).  We are challenged to make haste when called to service, to take risks, to heed the angel’s injunction “Do not be afraid,” to not get stuck in fear—a fear of “smelling like the sheep” or responding to those people and circumstances that make us uncomfortable.

Let us stay awake this Christmas and throughout this year that we not lose sight of God’s messengers bringing us good news….that Jesus, the Lord, is present in our midst!