1932nd Anniversary

Spring was beginning to brighten over the hills of Nazareth, in Galilee. Mary watched the dandelions, listened to the birds, dreamed of the bridalhood soon to crown her betrothal to the boy Joseph. But one night a voice clove through her dreams like a sword edged with moonlight : "Hail, thou that art highly favored, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou among women!"

Mary awoke, and rising from her white pallet fell to her knees, frightened, for a figure of blinding light stood above her.

But the Angel spoke comfortingly:

"Fear not, Mary, for thou shalt . . . bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. . . ."

Then Mary bowed her fair head and answered: "Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word."

And the Angel vanished into the breath of a little spring wind, that dawn at Nazareth.--(St. Luke I, 26:38; and the famed painting by Dante Gabriel Rossetti.)

But when the boy Joseph found his beloved already heavy with child, he was quite heartbroken. He said nothing, but he reflected how he might put his betrothed from him, gently and without scandal, because he loved her notwithstanding. While he pondered thus one night the Angel came to him, and said: "Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife; for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus; for he shall save his people from their sins." So Joseph was reassured, and took Mary as his wife.--(St. Matt. I, 18:25.)

Summer passed with its flowers, fall with its gleaning; the stalks stood bare in the fields. A general taxation had been decreed for all the Roman Empire. In compliance with custom it became necessary for Joseph to make the nine days' journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, far south in the province of Judaea, the city of David, there to be taxed. It was nigh Mary's time but he took her with him.

Bethlehem was crowded. Joseph could find no room at the inn, or any decent lodging. So humbly in a stable, warmed by the breath of kine, the Babe was born, Mary wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him wailing in a manger, between an ox and an ass; and the animals fell to their knees before the Babe. -(St. Luke II, 1:7; and tradition.)

Up in the hills that frosty night, huddled in their mantles about a tiny blaze, shepherds were watching their sheep. A sudden glory fell about them, and a shape of beauty stood before them and said: "Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born ... a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord." Then for a moment all around stood a multitude of heavenly figures crying: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace . . ."

When they had gathered their startled wits, the shepherds went to Bethlehem and found the Babe in the manger, and impulsively adored him. But his mother wondered that strangers should come and thus adore her child; and she adored him herself, and was more sure of his goodness.--(St. Luke II, 8:21.)

On that same starry night, far away, three wise men of Persia saw a star shining more brilliantly than any other star, moving and beckoning. Being wise men they followed it, night after night. Westward it led, over the mountains into Judaea, and finally it hung above a house where Joseph now had lodged his little family. They entered; and it seems that Mary was with the Babe; and the wise men fell on their knees adoring him just as the shepherds had done. This time Mary wondered less.

The wise men gave him gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh, and went their way exalted.

This was the twelfth day after the birth of Our Lord, now called the feast of Epiphany, and ends the proper cycle of Christmastide.--(St. Matt. II, 1:12; and tradition.)

This week the Christian world, with the exception of some branches of the Eastern church,* began celebration of the 1932nd anniversary of the birth of the Babe: the greatest and most nearly universal festival in which mankind rejoices. Yet nowhere was any city so entirely given over to the celebration as Rome, the eternal city with its countless churches.

Among all the churches of Rome, however, there was one where no preparations for the ancient midnight mass were being made.

To reach it you go around past the ruinous walls of the famed Coliseum and up a mean street between two historic hills, the Palatine and the Esquiline. Presently you knock at the gate of San Clemente, and a guide admits you. He tells you of the subterranean waters of Rome, and how they flooded with their darkling tide the mouldering basilica of the first Christian church in the city.

Then down a stone stairs he leads you, and you hear above the drone of his narrative the plash of those waters themselves. A white bust gazes at you from the shadows as you start down stairs. It is the grave face of a citizen of the U.S., a friend of Calvin Coolidge, His Eminence William Henry Cardinal O'Connell, Archbishop of Boston. Descending beneath the bust, you enter a small grotto-like room with a vaulted ceiling. Little remains to indicate that it was. a church; and yet St. Peter and St. Paul may have worshipped here, and certainly the first Christians met here in trembling for their agape or love-feast. Saint Clement, fourth pope, may have said mass within these walls. Proudly, strangely, the U.S. visitor learns that it was through the efforts of Boston's Cardinal that the engineering work necessary to retrieve this chapel from the blinding waters was financed and completed. For in addition to his station as Archbishop of Boston, Cardinal O'Connell is titular priest of San Clemente and loves his church.*

The little ancient church is just one stratum of historic ruin under the present San Clemente. Below it is the cadaver of a Roman dwelling of the first century; below that are the walls, the sacrificial altars, of what is thought to have been a Mithraic temple of the second century before Christ. And below that are slabs of the great wall of Tarquin, enduring from some four centuries earlier.

Introibo. In his own way, Cardinal O'Connell, senior U.S. dignitary of the Roman Catholic Church/- planned his Christmas, back home in Boston. Christmas eve he will say farewell to his inseparable companion, the black French poodle Moro, to pay a visit to orphan asylums. Christmas day he visits the hospitals. But at midnight, when the first bells peal their glad tidings, he enters the chancel of his Cathedral of the Holy Cross, vested in stately robes, to pontificate at the midnight mass, oldest of Christmas rites.

Introibo ad altare del. ... "I will go in unto the altar of God. Unto God, Who giveth joy to my youth." . . .

When the organ sounds its joyous diapason, Cardinal O'Connell will listen with the ears of a notable composer. In a basement he found the oldest Christian church in Rome. In another basement likewise, when he was a student at St. Charles College, Maryland, he found a broken-down melodeon. Some of the pipes would sound, however, and he sat there playing, lost to everything else, including his classes.

Father Denis, head of the college, wrathful went to hunt the truant. He discovered him, dreaming over the dusty keyboard.

His ire melted. "So you play? We must have the derelict repaired, and then you shall come whenever you feel in the mood. . . ." That was the beginning of studies which made of young O'Conrrell an accomplished composer, whose settings of religious music, even in large orchestral arrangements, are still played.

Cardinal O'Connell is a scholar, a great organizer,* a most understanding man. None knows better than he that, while his Church is the largest single religious unit in the U.S., the combined Protestant bodies are far more numerous.

Indeed, an impartial observer, mindful of the origin of many a Christmas custom, might think of this holiday as one that embraces all creeds, all times, in a common human experience. It occurs at the time of the winter solstice, when the sun reaches its farthest point south, and the day begins to grow longer. Pagans throughout the world, in ages past, held festivals at this period. In ancient Rome at the Saturnalia (Dec. 17-21), windows and rooms were decked with holly wreaths; and at the Sigittaria (Dec. 22), it was customary to give presents, especially dolls, to the children.

The origin of the Christmas tree is lost in antiquity. As a Christmas feature, however, it was mentioned first in a manuscript of the time of Luther, and was adopted first by the Germans. A German gentlewoman was visiting in England over Christmastide early in the last century, and part of her celebration was a little fir-tree lighted with candles. It was pretty, and next year Prince Albert had a Christmas tree for his wife, the queen at Windsor Castle; and after that its popularity was established in Britain. It was a German army that took, as well as Death, the Christmas tree to France. During the Franco-Prussian war the Germans, celebrating Christmas in their fashion, spread a love for the custom all through the invaded country. It remained for the U.S. to develop the municipal Christmas tree, erected on the public square in many a city, token of the whole community's rejoicing.

The custom of singing carols had a definite Christian origin. Early Franciscan friars, strolling through Italy, put the tale of the birth of the Babe into homely ballad form, the better to win simple hearts. Over the Alps they went, throughout the World, singing of the sweet mystery of Bethlehem. Their songs lingered behind them. The Spanish peasant added episodes out of his dark Moorish imagination. In one group of Spanish carols the three wise men become gypsies, who read the palms and tell the fortunes of Jesus, Mary, Joseph. In Germany an ancient custom still endures, in some old-world villages: that of singing carols from the church towers.

Like tree and carol, from land to land Christmas custom and spirit have been carried through the centuries, whether by warriors, travellers, missionaries. Thus on this one greatest feast-day of the year the World is kin.

*The year of Our Lord's birth is generally calculated, by modern Biblical criticism, as the fourth preceding the Christian era. Reforms in the calendar made by Gregory XIII, when ten days were dropped from the year, were not accepted by certain branches of the Eastern church, which therefore celebrate Christmas approximately at the time of the Western Epiphany.

*The word "cardinal" comes from the title of the_ priests of the historic Roman parishes centuries ago, the "incardinati." In memory of this every cardinal today is titular of one of those parishes. To Cardinal O'Connell was assigned San Clemente.

/-Archbishop O'Connell was created Cardinal in 1911. Ten years later Archbishop Denis J. Dougherty of Philadelphia was elevated to the cardinalate. The only other cardinals in the U. S., Archbishop Patrick Joseph Hayes of New V ork and Archbishop George William Mundelein of Chicago, were both elevated on March 24 1924.

*Among his works was the revival of medieval guilds: the Guild of St. Luke, for physicians; St. Apollonia (tortured by having her teeth broken out), for dentists; St. Genesius, for stenographers, secretaries; St. Zita, for domestics; St. Agnes, for high school girls; St. Imelda, for factory girls; the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin, for telephone operators.