Sign

When you promise the moon and the stars to someone you love, you are almost always expected to prove that with signs to show you mean what you have promised. The sign you give need not be galactic or grand; it can be as simple as your steadfast presence or enduring patience. It can be as stable as a home you build with devoted industry and sacrifice. It can be as small as a thoughtful word of affection or a joyful remembrance of little things. It can be as solemn as a decision to follow your dream.

When the Lord promises Ahaz protection for his people who are weary of war, Ahaz is told to ask for a sign. Ahaz replies that he “will not tempt the Lord” and weary him. The Lord nonetheless gives a sign for him to know that the Lord means to keep his promise. The sign is a virgin who “shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall name him Emmanuel.”

With all due respect to heaven, that’s the sign? Two thousand years ago, that would have been earthshaking, but I assure you the sign of a virgin with child may no longer astonish the 21st century. Given how far we’ve gone in mapping the human genome and cloning sheep, it is only a matter of time before virgins can give birth to children.

This Christmas it is tempting to tempt God and weary him with a better sign. After all, the sign of the belen may no longer be as wondrous as it was when we were children. In our annual rituals of putting up the lanterns and the lights, we may have lost the point of those pretty lights. We may have grown so accustomed to the dark side we couldn’t care less if the night should ever go away. Those pretty lights are pretty in the dark anyway.

This Christmas it is tempting to dare God to give us a clearer sign to prove his presence and love. After all, there are moments we would rather believe those signs that show how hopeless and selfish our lives can be at times. In the many ways we terrorize one another and wreak havoc on the earth, we seem to have forgotten our humanity. We may have been so enamored of our rightness we no longer see our blindness and our deep desire for redemption or forgiveness.

But we shall not weary our God with another sign to prove his love for us. For we know in faith that the point of signs is not to take the ground from under our feet and astound us. Even if astonishment is what we sometimes seek, we know that it is the chronic condition of our WDD (wonder-deficit disorder) that can indeed be wearisome. The point of signs is not to compel us to believe; that would only take the freedom from under our souls and enslave us.

When the sun dances and our rosary beads turn to gold and we find the tomb empty, there is almost always something just as captivating there to nudge us to doubt.

And this is just as well for we discover something deeply human and lovely in the very ambivalence of signs. It is the fuzziness itself that helps us to mean our love and our faith. Thus we can say for better, for worse (who knows, we will never be sure), we will continue to love no matter what happens. Thus can I make this profession in love: even if I am not sure about your love for me, I am sure about my love for you. Even if I do not know you forgive me, I will ask for your forgiveness.

Thus can I make this confession in faith: even if I do not always see your presence, I will be present to you. Even if things are not clear, and specially because things are not clear, I will continue to entrust myself and risk loving you.

When bread is multiplied or water turned into wine, the point is not the miracle bread or the vintage wine or the wonder-working. The point of the sign is the One who holds in his hands the bread and the wine and the wonder of it all.

For the sign that is shown us is more than a roadside arrow pointing to God. The sign that is given us is God himself in the flesh, in the person of Jesus Christ, born of the virgin Mary. The sign itself is also the One signified, who is himself therefore the ultimate sacrament and full embodiment of God who means to be with us in love.

Such a sign that is given us of our redemption is not even galactic or grand: only a virgin with child, and a gallant man who follows a fuzzy dream to take her and her child into his home.

When the Christmas star is stilled and our trees bear beads of light and we find an infant cradled in a manger, there is almost always something just as captivating there to nudge us to believe.

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Fr. Jose Ramon T. Villarin SJ is President of Xavier University, Ateneo de Cagayan. For feedback on this column, email [email protected]