Letter to the readers
Can we still celebrate Christmas at all?
Can we still celebrate Christmas in the face of wars and personal and global threats of all kinds? Many people are asking themselves this question. We at the "Krone" have collected voices from the clergy in all nine federal states and asked them for their Christmas message. And we asked our youngest readers to draw their idea of Christmas - you can see a small selection of them here!
"Yes, we can celebrate Christmas despite all the crises," assures Father Bernhard Eckerstorfer from Kremsmünster Abbey in Upper Austria in his message to us and our readers from Rome, where he is currently Rector of the Benedictine University of Sant'Anselmo. "This feast is about the fact that God has fully entered this world in Jesus Christ and knows and lives our lives from the inside. The greatest gift of all time!"
Tyrolean Bishop Hermann Glettler also refers to the many crises and says: "Despite all the catastrophes, Christmas is a celebration of resistant hope."
"In view of the many crises, the Christmas message for me this year is 'Do not be afraid', as the angel said to the shepherds in the field," says Styrian Bishop Wilhelm Krautwaschl, giving hope.
"For me, the central message of Christmas is that we are not alone! God becomes man in Jesus Christ in order to be very close to us. He therefore understands first-hand what being human really means: He goes through the ups and downs of our lives with us. Knowing this is always a great comfort to me" - this is the Christmas message from Soror Franziska Madl, Prioress of the Dominican Sisters in Vienna and Deputy Chairwoman of the Austrian Conference of Religious Orders.
Franz Brei, the parish priest of Jennersdorf in Burgenland, who is also known as a singing priest, reminds us that Christmas is only Christmas "when we look with an open heart to the child in the manger in Bethlehem, that gives peace."
"Christmas is the festival on which God comes to us, in a sense follows us like the shepherd follows the lost sheep," says Salzburg Archbishop Franz Lackner. And explains: "So let us also reflect and feel what we have lost - it seems to me that it is often God himself. May we reflect on this so that there may be peace on earth."
Cathedral priest Peter Allmaier, who is also a firefighter in Klagenfurt, says: "Christmas is the festival of longing, the desire to be safe in a You. Because the lack of a relationship has become a great burden in our world."
For Lower Austria's Bishop Alois Schwarz, "the greatest gift at Christmas is to be able to believe in the message of love and peace that emanates from the child in Bethlehem".
For Benno Elbs, Bishop of Vorarlberg, "the child in the manger is like a love letter from God to the world". His wish: "That people can feel and accept the affection, tenderness and peace. The prerequisite for this would be for people's hearts to become a manger so that love and peace can find a place."
So we at the "Krone" wish our readers a Merry Christmas!
This article has been automatically translated,
read the original article here.
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