Tomorrow is Christmas Eve, the next day is Christmas. Regardless of what the context clues from the bible might say about when or what time of year all this happened, it is celebrated NOW!! (or in a day or two, then The Feast of the Three Kings etc).

One may say "I don't believe all this crazy stuff. It could not have happened." Christians say, it happened once. Once, God became flesh to show those lost in the world the way out, to show dying is not the end, fear is no excuse, and to give us a different perspective on our lives and our purpose.

We're asked to keep the commandments, to accept this sacrifice given to us for us, and to confess our sins when we fail to put God first. We're asked to do this so when we fail we can get back up again and do better. We're asked to be humble, to cultivate the virtues, and to avoid the vices. We're asked to understand and redirect the "passions" that come over us and not be lead around by them.

We're asked to essentially better ourselves, which is something we should want to do anyway. We're asked to strive for something better than the petty or selfish things we want. We're asked to love those around us. We're asked to remember that our enemy is not the person in front of us, but those who misled or lied to them and put us at odds with each other. We told our enemies are the power and principalities of the world that would keep us from being selfless and keep us afraid or keep us distracted by empty pleasures, who would feed us candy instead of nutritious food, who would ask us to trust them and not God, who would have us so afraid of any discomfort that we would endure any number of things in the vain hope of being safe.

And what would we get for it? Fear. Maybe a lot of shiny or stupid things. A lot of distractions to keep our minds off of what is wrong or what could be right. We get fake food in stead of real food. We get a fake immune system instead of our real, God-given, one. Get get lost in lust instead of even understanding love.

The beautiful thing, to me, about the Marian devotions in Catholicism is that it points to the most beautiful and inspiring parts of Christianity, and shows the worst parts of Catholicism to be distractions from the religion of Christ. Many bad popes, many bad clergy, will burn in hell along with many bad and lost and selfish people. Mary her self told us this many times. Do not worry about what will come of the truly evil. We've been promised that is not the way for us to go. May they learn the err of their ways and repent, as we hope to each time we go to confession, or each time we confess to God and try to start over again.

We were shown the way. By Jesus? Yes. But also by Mary. This is something I think we benefit from thinking about, and something I wish more Protestants could see as Catholics see it: the birth of the man who was God incarnated in the flesh, the Word of God, the Logos of God who lived as we live and died as we will and suffered and was humiliated as we rarely ever could be, was made possible because Mary said yes and declared herself to be the handmaid of the Lord. By humbling her self and giving her life over to be Jesus' mother, and serving Him and God, she will forever be called Blessed. To lead, one must serve: she started that.

Catholic tradition holds that she was preserved in a special way both to accomplish that task (Immaculate Conception) and it holds that she was assumed up into heaven. A mother carries around in her tissue of the children she has. Mary had tissue from Jesus in her after he was born, and even after he died. Does the assumption of Mary into heaven seem more justified knowing that a part of him physically would still be here after the ascension? To me, it does.

Please pray the Rosary, mediate on the mysteries, the mysteries around the birth (the Joyful Mysteries), and around the ministry of Jesus (the Luminous Mysteries), and around the passion and death (the Sorrowful Mysteries), and around he mysteries of the resurrection (the Glorious Mysteries). Read up on some of the amazing apparitions and miracles associated with Our Lady.

Jesus came in mercy as a friend. When he returns it will in glory as a judge. That last part sounds harsh but many think it will be a choice we make ourselves. The idea is that in so choosing to be lost in the distractions of the world, in chasing their own passions and libido and greed, in running from and bowing down to those who are obviously lying all the time and always getting people to do little evils and little indifferences, and little chips away at their souls, that such people will choose an eternity of misery every single time over and over. They don't worship God because they worship the world or worship themselves. Some might think they worship God but still want such worldly things that they might actually want God to worship them. They might never see it that way, but the actions and the desires might be no different. Don't. Merry Christmas! Take a moment to thank Blessed Mary and Jesus, and mediate on what it's really all about.