Hieronymos: «Let us feel responsible for the health of all»

The sacrament of the Eucharist was celebrated this morning by Archbishop Hieronymos at the Holy Metropolitan Church of Athens, where the appropriate protection measures against the coronavirus were observed.

«We need responsibility and hope. Now that every naked person can see very well that the pandemic is a real problem, we must feel responsible for everyone's health.», says, among others, Archbishop Ieronymos of Athens and All Greece, in his Christmas message, which was read today in all the churches of Athens.

At the same time, the Archbishop referred to his personal experience, saying «the personal experience of illness and hospitalization sets the right order of things and emotions.

«The birth of Christ is charity indeed. Let us become this year, in a more sacrificial way than ever before, bearers of the love that springs from the Cave of Bethlehem. This love claims the whole world. I wish everyone a true and blessed Christmas!»

After the Divine Liturgy, the Primate of the Greek Church wished everyone a happy and blessed birthday.

The Archbishop's entire message for Christmas is as follows:

«My brethren and beloved children in the Lord,

«The inseparable all...was separated in the stomach... and not a stranger to nature partook of the daily bread».
The mystery of Bethlehem was then and always has been a source of infinite bounty to humanity. We were given to exist as God exists. And God is love and love comes from God. We wonder every year how we will experience a true Christmas. Perhaps this year, with the tragic, as it turned out, condition of the pandemic, we can better reflect on what it really means that God became man? That the Almighty has encompassed weakness, ultimate poverty and suffering? That he lived through the scandal of abandonment and death?;

Let us consider that those of us who want to be His disciples are called in these difficult times to glorify with the angels His birth, to taste something of His omnipotence and at the same time to participate in His extreme humility. To experience the certainty of His divinity with an excess of love for the brother, with profound humility; that which the Lord indicated in the wilderness, condemning every tendency to sensationalism and logical appropriation of the supernatural: «thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God».

We need responsibility and hope. Now that every wise person can see very well that the pandemic is a real problem, we must feel responsible for everyone's health. Let us care for the vulnerable. Personal experience of illness and hospitalization sets the right order of things and emotions. We owe a lot of care.

Besides, let us not scandalize the brothers with uncritical attitudes. Let us respect those who are perhaps too afraid. Who, after all, is without fear?;
But a Christian is also a man of hope. Hope and faith in the divine Infant who allows the trial. Let us not be paralyzed by fear.

Our life belongs to the Lord. He came forth victorious and to overcome. He will give the way out. He is the life. It is a fact that communion with God and worship scandalize the forces of evil. Some take the opportunity to become wicked and offensive. Do not be afraid. Our response to them will always be love. Love in truth. We will always seek to be free in our worship. With respect for the common effort and sanitary safety rules, which we have observed from the beginning, and with commitment to the freedom of the Faith.

My brethren and beloved children in the Lord,
In this unexpected world war, some people were the worst affected. They lost their own people. Let our prayer for them be our gift this year at the feet of the Divine Infant.

I also invite you with a personal charge to pray separately for the heroes, the ascetics of this story. They are the doctors, the nurses, all those who work in the ministry of the suffering. In all corners of the earth they are working the work of a true charity. They forget that they exist for us to exist. We are grateful to them.

My brothers,
The birth of Christ is charity indeed. Let us become this year, in a more sacrificial way than ever before, bearers of the love that springs from the Cave of Bethlehem. This love claims the whole world. I wish everyone a true and blessed Christmas!
Christ is born glorified!».