The Nativity

Each year, the Nativity draws us back to the great mystery at the heart of our faith: that God chose to come to us as a child. Advent teaches us how to wait—but never without joy, and never without hope.

It is not a season of gloom or dimmed lights. It is the lighting of candles against the darkness. It is patient expectation. It is the slow schooling of the soul in rejoicing even before the feast arrives.

As the Church waits for Christ—at Bethlehem and again at the end of all things—she waits confidently. She waits because she knows how the story ends. When all is said and done, the last word does not belong to the noise of the world, but to the promises of God.

At our Advent Nativity Service, our children proclaim this story once more, and in doing so they teach us. We rejoice with them, and we invite you to behold this true tale again, as if for the first time. Their joy is not small or sentimental. It is the joy of the Church herself—alive, hopeful, and utterly confident that Christ has come, that He is present now, and that He will come again.

Our children remind us that something real happened in Bethlehem. God entered history—not with spectacle, but with humility—and the world was never the same. Light came into the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

As a school, we understand ourselves to be one small outpost of the Church’s joyful mission. We are formed not by fear or grim resolve, but by festivity, by delight, and by confidence in our Savior. This evening, may we receive the Nativity as our students do: attentively, gladly, and with the settled joy of those who know that Jesus Christ is the light of the world.