CHRISTMAS NOVENA - Day 9: O Morning Star!

24th December: O Morning Star...

The 7 O-Antiphons are over with yesterday...
but the Novena ends today...with the rising of the Morning Star!

O Morning Star, Radiance of eternal light
Sun of Justice, come and enlighten those who live in darkness
and in the Shadow of death.

Morning Star, actually is the star that is seen in the east shining bright just before the dawn! It is considered the imminent sign of the morning that is already rising.

The Lord is not just near...but the Lord is here!!!
We celebrate the Rising Star, the Morning Star that announces the break of day!
The Lord comes to rule in our hearts, not just in the world...
Let us prepare ourselves..for the Lord is here

The Reign - God's abode here and now!

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Fourth Wednesday in Advent - December 24, 2025

2 Samuel 7: 1-5,8-12,14,16; Luke 1: 67-79

The Reign, which is the hope of the trustful pilgrims, can be demonstrated in varied ways. It is true that we have to work for it, strain our way to make its presence felt... but we would be terribly mistaken to think that it is our doing! That is the mistake that David does, as we see in the Word today. 

When David resolves to build an abode for God, God retorts: are you going to build a house for me? I shall build a house for you, says the Lord. The first message of the Word today is - that God makes a house... God forms us into a people, gives us an identity and commissions us with our lives which are challenged to become a sign and sacramente of God's presence wherever we are.

The Lord, not only builds a house for us God's children, but deigns to make God's own home amidst us. Emmanuel... whom we have prepared to behold and we are all set to receive in few hours from now... is absolutely God with us. In Jesus' vicinity to us, we see God making home with us and becoming part of our being and our experience.

The Lord comes to visit us, making a home with us amply signifies that. The Lord does not only come to visit us, but to stay with us, stay in us and stay in every experience that makes up our lives. The Lord abides here and now, in the present, at every moment and at every instance of our lives. Hence Reign, is not something we arrive at... it is something we abide in, and something that will allow God to abide here and now, amidst us, within us and with us. 

Emmanuel, God is with us; and the Reign is where God is, where God abides... here and now.