Morning Briefings

While they were there, the time came for her to have her child, and she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

– Luke 2: 6-7

In this tender season, rich with memories, let us remember all of those who have been lights along our way; the loved ones that we hold forever, in our hearts.

– Deborah Gordon Cooper from
Christmas Blessings

Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.

– Luke 10:23-24

“We don’t use money in heaven,” Guardian Angel Clarence explained to despondent businessman George Bailey who replied, “Oh yeah? Comes in pretty handy down here, Bub.”

– Henry Travers as Clarence, James Stewart as George
It’s a Wonderful Life

Stockings are filled while children are sleeping. Nicholas did his gift giving secretly, under the cover of darkness. He didn’t want to be seen and recognized as he wanted those he helped to give thanks to God.

–
St. Nicholas Center website

December’s gifts–custom, ceremony, celebration, consecration–come to us wrapped up, not in tissue and ribbons, but in cherished memories. This is the month of miracles. The oil that burns for eight days, the royal son born in a stable, the inexplicable return of Light on the longest, darkest day of the year. Where there is love, there are always miracles.

– Sarah Ban Breathnach
Simple Abundance

When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem saying, ‘Where is the newborn of the Jews? We saw his star at its rising and have come to do him homage.’

– Matthew 2:1-2

While they were there, the time came for her to have her child, and she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

– Luke 2: 6-7

Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.

– Luke 10:23-24

In Missoula, Mont., a man spent more than $1,200 to pay down the balances of six customers whose layaway orders were about to be returned to a Kmart store’s inventory because of late payments. Store employees reached one beneficiary on her cellphone at Seattle Children’s Hospital, where her son was being treated for an undisclosed illness. “She was yelling at the nurses, ‘We’re going to have Christmas after all!’” store manager Josine Murrin said.

– Margery A. Beck, AP
Anonymous donors pay off Kmart layaway accounts