Becoming Divine

Pope Benedict noted Sunday that

Only one day separates the Fourth Sunday of Advent from holy Christmas. Tomorrow night we will gather to celebrate the great mystery of love that does not cease to stupify us. God became the Son of Man so that we could become sons of God.

Our distance from recovering our divine destiny is at once a lifetime and, because of the mystery of the Incarnation, which we name Christmas, no distance at all. The more we live this mystery of God-with-us, the more it

ignites in those who receive it a love of neighbor that moves our freedom to give as a gift that which has been freely received. Being reached by the presence of God, who draws near to us at Christmas, is an inestimable gift, a gift that is capable of making us live in the universal embrace of the friends of God, in that network of friendship with Christ that binds heaven and earth, that directs human freedom toward its fulfillment and that, if lived in its truth, flourishes in a gratuitous love and a concern for the good of all people.

The pope articulated well the reason why people pray for peace intensely this time each year.