A Time For Listening

"Do You Hear What I Hear?" - the title of one of the Christmas song we hear played during these days, composed in 1962 by Noel Regney and Gloria Shayne. It is but one of the many favourites that lift up our spirits at Christmas with its inspirational message. But no sooner does the music end than we hear another report about the massacre of the twenty little children in Newtown, Connecticut, and with that a shadow darkens our spirits. We may want to turn quickly to something else to dwell on, perhaps to the scriptures, the real Christmas story. We take up Matthew's account of the birth of Jesus reading in chapter one to chapter two. What! There at the end of chapter two is the account of the massacre of the Holy Innocence. "A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamintation; Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be consoled, since they are no more."

You realise that evil is not foreign to Christmas it is the reason why Christmas is necessary in the first place. Having failed to prevent the plan for the Incarnation to happen during the rebellion of the fallen angels, Evil must now undertake to destroy this Messenger of hope and salvation before anyone can hear His voice and be rescued from the reign of darkness and untruth.

In his rules for discernment, Saint Ignatius of Loyola describes two possible situations in which a soul might be found. The first group are those who have yet to hear and embrace the message of hope. In this case, evil will do all it can to prevent these souls from hearing the message by Drowning out His voice with every possible appeal from the secular world, deluding it into thinking truth is of its own making.

The second group are those who have heard the message and joyfully embraced it, striving to conform their lives to its wisdom and truth. Here evil must use every means of deception, striving to confuse and discredit and mislead the soul away from what has been revealed and believed, leading it back into its former isolation and darkness of mind, making it impossible for the soul to ever hear His voice again.

The Lord's voice will never be silenced and defeated, a lesson evil refuses to learn. Let us not be discouraged by the negative shouting that blares out around us. Let us continue to be attentive to His Voice of Hope. Let those with ears to hear, listen. Do you hear what I hear?