OCA Chancery
Syosset, New York
To the Reverend Clergy, Monastics, and Faithful of the Orthodox Church in America
Dearly beloved,
Christ Is Born! Glorify Him!
These words of festal greeting announce God’s love for His creation. The Nativity of our Lord is a love that is revealed in a way that surpasses human reason and understanding. For today we celebrate the Divine gift of the Son of God becoming incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary.
The event of Christ’s birth has always been one of hope. This hope is recognized and experienced when we contemplate His reigning over all creation while lying in a manger. This hope drives away all fear and anxiety. This hope raises the human spirit from the despair of confronting its own mortality.
Today we celebrate God becoming man. Today we are called by the incarnate Lord to receive Him into our minds and hearts. The Feast beckons us to discover that by the birth of the Savior all things are made new. Indeed, mortality is destroyed by immortality.
Rejoicing in the birth of Jesus Christ we offer the entire world our celebration—we offer the entire world its very renewal. We are called to convey the transfiguring power of the Feast to a world “groaning in travail” (Romans 8:23). As the faithful people of God we must proclaim to all who hunger and thirst for new life that Jesus Christ has come to comfort creation by taking upon Himself our sin and death.
He, whose birth we celebrate this day, is He who destroys death by His own death. Christ is born and Adam’s glory is restored. Christ is born and we are no longer shrouded by death but clothed in eternal life. Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will to man!
With love in the newborn Christ,
+ Metropolitan THEODOSIUS
and the Members of the Holy Synod of Bishops