What do we know of our God? GOD, our creator. Who is he? What can we say we know and understand about him? We are taught from an early age that he is all knowing, all powerful, and everywhere present. These are the three omni's we hear about. The word omni means ‘all’. God is omniscient or all knowing. God is omnipotent, meaning all powerful. And God is omnipresent – he is found everywhere; in all times and places. The Bible and the Catechism go on to tell us, God is eternal, he is just and merciful, he is holy and separate from sin and all impurity. He is true and faithful. As philosophers, theologians and bible scholars tackled this question on who God is, we learn that God is simple, indivisible; he is Ipsum Esse Subsistens, he is the very nature of Being itself, as He himself tells us, “I AM who I Am.” He is un-created, the first cause, the unmoved mover. He is neither male nor female, incorporeal, he is wholly spirit. He is invisible. He is the supra-mundane (above the world) intelligence, guiding creation. Some, like Aquinas, approach God by describing what he is not, rather than what he is. He is not composed of parts, he is not finite, he is not contained in space or subject to time, he is not a creature, and He, God is not caused.
In this quick synopsis of the ways man has attempted to describe and know God, we are left a little more informed of who God is and is not, but these beautiful-crafted descriptions can leave us stranded and for those not philosophically minded, even unsatisfied. But now we can turn to the heart of the matter. For God is love. God loves. God loves his creation, loves us, each of us, and not in a distant, remote or dispassionate way, but in a truly personal and intimate way. For these last 2000 years and for the many before, he tells us he is a God of relationship, for love requires relationship. We see this relationship first within the Godhead itself, as the Father loves the Son, and the Son obeys the Father in the Spirit, who is the expression of the love that passes between them. And we see this relationship between the creator and his creation, you and me. For the mystery of God reveals itself and invites each of us into his revelation and into a growing relationship with him.
The rejection of this relationship was the sin of King Ahaz in our first reading. Isaiah encouraged Ahaz to ask for any sign to show God was with his people and would protect them from the Syro-Ephraimite alliance that threatened Judah. Ahaz was from the line of David, and heir to the covenant's promise of protection. But Ahaz would not ask for a sign, preferring to appear pious or perhaps relying on his alliance with Syria. But here comes Isaiah saying, "you will not ask for a sign, but a sign will be given anyway, for the virgin is with child and will give birth to a son whom she will call Immanuel, meaning God is with us."
Ahaz was invited to make the presence of God evident by way of a sign, but he declined that invitation. Ahaz’s ‘no’ stands in clear contrast to Mary who would give her fiat, her ‘yes’ to God’s invitation to bare and give birth to the Son of God. A visible and clear sign that God was, is and remains with us. And Joseph would likewise give his yes in response to the encouraging words of the angel he encountered in his dreams.
Just like Mary and Joseph, we too are being asked to participate in the life of God, in the plan of salvation, by our assent, our own yes. We too are being called to make present to everyone and everywhere the love of this omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent God. A God who so loves the world that he chooses to come to us as a little child. A child that was held, loved, cared for, who would grow up to show us by his life and death the depth of God's love for each of us. A child born of the infinite yet humbled to share in our humanity.
On this, the last Sunday before Christmas, we prepare ourselves to meet our God – the infinite God made present as a little child – so small, so vulnerable, dependent and innocent. In union with Mary and Joseph, we say our, "yes" to God in our lives, and by this demonstrate to others, to family, friends, neighbors and strangers that Jesus is Emmanuel, God truly with us.
Deacon Peter Bujwid
St. Agnes Church, Arlington, Massachusetts
Sunday 21st December 2025
