22 December 2026 · Syro-Malabar Rite
Open in the Daily Word appAlso: Latin Rite · Syro-Malankara Rite · മലയാളം
“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children.” Galatians 4:4–5
Paul gives the shortest Christmas creed: “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman.” The eternal Son receives a human mother; and through him we receive adoption, so that the Spirit in our hearts cries “Abba! Father!” We are no longer slaves but children and heirs.
John's Prologue continues: John the Baptist “came as a witness to testify to the light.” The true light came to his own, “and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him… he gave power to become children of God.” Christmas is a choice: to receive or to refuse.
Theme: “Children of God.”
The Son born of a woman makes us God's children; to receive him is to become one.
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14
“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law.” Galatians 4:4
Apply: Thank Mary for giving Jesus to the world.
“He said to me, “You are my son; today I have begotten you.”” Psalm 2:7
“And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God.” Galatians 4:6–7
Apply: Pray the Our Father slowly today.
“Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.” Isaiah 60:1
“He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.” John 1:11–12
Apply: Make room for Christ through confession.
The Son became a child of Mary so that we might become children of God.
Let us receive him.
Take-home resolution: Prepare a place for Jesus: confession before Christmas.
Dear friends, St Paul tells the Galatians: when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children (Galatians 4:4–5).
Born of a woman. God did not drop from the sky as an adult. He chose a mother, a womb, a birth, a childhood. He entered our history at a particular time and place: in the days of Caesar Augustus, in Bethlehem of Judea. The fullness of time was the moment God chose.
And the purpose: so that we might receive adoption as children. Because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba! Father! (Galatians 4:6). The Son became a son of Mary so that we might become sons and daughters of God.
In the Gospel John introduces John the Baptist: there was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify to the light. He himself was not the light (John 1:6–8). Then the sad line: he came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him (John 1:11).
But the Gospel continues: to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God (John 1:12). Christmas is a question addressed to each of us: will I receive him?
Every family in Kerala is busy preparing: stars, cribs, cakes, new clothes. Good. But let us not be like Bethlehem, which had no room. Let us make room: a quiet hour of prayer, a good confession, reconciliation with someone. Then, receiving him, we will become what he came to make us: children of God. Amen.
Children, Jesus came so that we could be God's children. When you pray Our Father, remember that God is your Father!
Father, in the fullness of time you sent your Son, born of a woman, to make us your children. Let me receive him and live as your child. Amen.
Three days before Christmas, both readings ask how the Son came and what his coming does to us. Paul says it in one sentence: God sent his Son, born of a woman, so that we might be adopted. John says it with an image: the true light came into the world, and those who received him became children of God. The two readings arrive at the same word: children.
Setting.
Paul writes to Gentile Christians in Galatia who are being urged by other teachers to take on circumcision and the whole Mosaic law. He has just told them that all who belong to Christ are “Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise” (3:29). Now he explains what an heir is, with a picture from family law that everyone in his world understood.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law,” (4:4)
“Sent” means that the Son was already with the Father before he was born. “Born of a woman” means that he is truly one of us. This is the only mention of Jesus’ mother in Paul’s letters, and she stands at the centre of the great turning point of time. “Born under the law” means that he lived as a son of Israel.
“in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children.” (4:5)
He takes our condition so that we may receive his. The word “redeem” recalls the price paid to release a slave.
“God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”” (4:6)
God sends twice: the Son, then the Spirit of the Son. It is the Spirit who cries “Abba” within us. Christian prayer is the voice of the Son in us, speaking to his Father.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism quotes Galatians 4:4–5 as the heart of the Good News: God has visited his people (CCC 422). Vatican II opens its teaching on Our Lady with this very verse (Lumen Gentium 52). The Catechism sees in this passage the joint mission of the Son and the Spirit (CCC 689), and it recalls the teaching of the Fathers, St Irenaeus among them, that the Son of God became the son of man so that we might become children of God (CCC 460).
Setting.
The reading comes from the Prologue of John’s Gospel (1:1–18). The great poem about the Word has just said that “the light shines in the darkness” (1:5). Then, without warning, it turns to a man with a name and a task. The fourth Gospel never calls him “the Baptist”. For this Gospel his whole identity is to be a witness.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light.” (1:8)
The whole of John’s greatness lies in that “not”. He later says, “He must increase, but I must decrease” (3:30).
“He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him.” (1:11)
The Word came to the world he made and to the people he had prepared. The verse describes the sadness of every refusal, not the guilt of one nation: see the question below.
“But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.” (1:12–13)
A note on the text. Almost all Greek manuscripts have the plural, “who were born”, meaning believers. A few early Latin witnesses, with St Irenaeus and Tertullian, have the singular, “who was born”, meaning Christ, and some modern versions have followed it. The plural is the accepted reading; the Virgin birth stands on Matthew and Luke, not on this verse.
How the Church reads it.
St Augustine loved the contrast between John and Jesus: John is the voice, Christ is the Word; the voice passes and the Word remains (Sermon 293, in substance). The Catechism uses John 1:12–13 when it teaches that to become children of God we must be “born from above” (CCC 526).
Who are “his own people”? Does John blame the Jews?
No. Mary, Joseph, the shepherds, John himself and all the apostles were Jews, and they received him. The verse speaks of the human refusal that the world as a whole shares (1:10). The Church teaches that the Jewish people as such are not to be blamed for the rejection and death of Christ (Nostra Aetate 4; CCC 597–598).
Abba is an Aramaic word, and Syriac, the language of our liturgical heritage, is a form of Aramaic. When the Syro-Malabar Church calls God “Father”, she stands very close to the speech in which Jesus himself first said it.