We are still in Christmas. The Church insists on that. She stretches the feast across days because the mystery is too large to be taken in all at once. The joy is real. Heaven has opened. God has come among us. The Word has taken flesh, and nothing can undo that triumph. The light shines, and it is not overcome. 

But this joy is not fragile, and it is not naïve. It is strong enough to look straight at the truth.  

That is why the Church does not ask us to leave Christmas behind when she places these witnesses before us. She asks us to understand Christmas more deeply. The Child in the manger has not come to make the world comfortable. He has come to save it. And salvation is costly.  

And the temptation has always been the same. When the cost of discipleship becomes clear, when the Cross comes into view, the instinct is to soften it. To make the message safer. To make the faith easier to carry by reshaping it so it does not press too hard against the world. That temptation is not new – but it is very present. 

We see it whenever the Church begins to speak more about comfort than conversion, more about synodality than truth, and more about accompaniment than fidelity. We see it when the sharp edges of the Gospel are sanded down so that no one is disturbed, no one is challenged, no one feels the weight of the Cross. We see it when what was once received with reverence is treated as an obstacle, when what was once handed down is described as rigid, and when the Church begins to borrow the language and priorities of the world rather than offering the world something different. 

But Christ did not come to make the world comfortable. And the Church was never meant to mirror the world so closely that the Cross disappears from view. When the manger is separated from the Cross, everything becomes distorted. And joy – real joy – is replaced by reassurance. But reassurance cannot save us. Only Christ can. 

This is why the Church places St. Stephen before us while the songs of Christmas are still being sung. It is why she reminds us of St. John the Apostle’s long fidelity, and the silent witness of the Holy Innocents. These are not interruptions. They are warnings given in love. They tell us what happens when Christ is truly welcomed – and what happens when He is resisted. 

The joy of Christmas does not lie in being affirmed by the world. It lies in belonging to Christ. And belonging to Christ has always required courage. 

The shadow of the manger is a Cross. And that shadow still falls across the Church today. This is why the Church does not let us linger too long in sentiment, even while the joy of Christmas still fills her prayer. She wants us to understand what kind of joy this really is. Not the joy of comfort preserved, but the joy of truth embraced. 

St. Stephen stands first beneath that shadow – and today, on his feast day, the Church places him before us while the joy of Christmas is still fresh. He is not looking for death. He is full of grace, full of the Holy Ghost, speaking because Christ has been born, because the Word has taken flesh and cannot be silenced. And when the cost comes, Stephen does not retreat. He does not reshape the truth to survive. He forgives; he entrusts himself to Christ, and he dies with the name of Jesus on his lips. The Cross has reached him – not as a surprise, but as the fulfillment of what Christmas began. 

Then there is St. John – the beloved disciple – and tomorrow, on his feast day, the Church places him before us. He was spared the sword but not the cost of truth. Christ entrusted him with the care of His Mother, and he carried her sorrow as his own. He, too, lives in the shadow of the Cross, though his path is different. He remains. He watches. He suffers the long obedience of fidelity. He carries the joy of the Incarnation through years when the world moves on and the Church grows weary. His martyrdom is quieter, but no less real. It reminds us that the Cross does not always fall in a single moment. Sometimes it rests on the shoulders for a lifetime. 

And then there are the Holy Innocents. They do not choose the Cross, but they are caught in the shadow because Christ has come. Power always trembles before truth, and when it trembles, it strikes the smallest first. Their lives tell us something sobering and something consoling at the same time: that the coming of Christ exposes the cruelty of the world, but also that no suffering escapes the reach of God’s mercy. Even here, the shadow of the Cross is not abandonment – it is the place where God gathers what the world destroys.  

Taken together, these days teach us how to live Christmas honestly and authentically. They tell us that joy and sacrifice are not opposites. They belong together. The shepherds rejoiced, but they returned to ordinary lives made holy by encounter. The wise men rejoiced, but they did not stay. They went home by another way – changed, watchful, and no longer aligned with the powers they once served. And so it is with us. 

To kneel at the manger is not the end of discipleship. It is the beginning. To adore the Child is to accept the Cross He brings with Him. To celebrate Christmas is to allow ourselves to be sent – into families, into workplaces, into parishes, into a culture that does not always welcome truth. 

The Church is most authentically herself when she remembers this. When she refuses to trade fidelity for comfort. When she allows the shadow of the Cross to remain visible, even during the days of celebration. Because once that shadow is denied, the manger becomes a decoration instead of a revelation, and joy becomes shallow instead of saving.  

The shadow of the manger is a Cross. It always has been. And that is not a loss. It is the promise that the Child we adore is the Savior who redeems, the King who reigns, and the Lord who walks with His people – even when fidelity costs them everything.  

And the Church widens our vision even more during these days, because she knows we need more than one kind of witness. She gives us not only martyrs and apostles, but a family – the Holy Family – living quietly beneath that same shadow. The Holy Family reminds us that the Cross looks like trust and perseverance – and that, too, belongs to Christmas. 

Then the Church brings before us St. Thomas Becket, who refused to trade the truth for peace with power. His martyrdom is a warning and a witness. He did not seek conflict, but he would not surrender the Church to the demands of the state. He reminds us that the Cross falls especially heavily on those entrusted with leadership, and that fidelity sometimes costs reputation, position, and even life itself. 

All of this still belongs to Christmas. This is why the Church stretches Christmas across days instead of letting it collapse into a moment. She knows the mystery must be lived, not merely admired. The joy is real – deeper than sentiment, stronger than fear – but it is a joy that knows where it is going. 

The shadow of the manger is a Cross. And to live Christmas fully is not to flee that shadow, but to walk within it – trusting that the Child who was born there is the same Lord who redeems, sustains, and remains with His people. 

And so, even as the Church still sings with Christmas joy – even as the Gloria has barely faded from our lips – the shadow of the Cross already stretches across the straw of the manger. This is not an interruption of Christmas. It is its meaning. 

The Child who lies in Mary’s arms did not come to make the world comfortable. He did not come to soothe consciences while leaving hearts unchanged. He came to save – and salvation always costs. 

That is why, within the very octave of Christmas, the Church places before us martyrs. 

We remember Saint Stephen, whose blood fell like seed upon the earth – and at whose feet stood a young man named Saul, holding the cloaks of those who stoned him. The Church’s first martyr preached one final homily, not with words, but with his death. And God received that blood as a prayer. 

For the man who consented to Stephen’s death would one day become Paul, apostle to the nations – proof that no suffering offered in love is ever wasted, and no witness given to Christ ever falls to the ground unseen by God. 

The shadow of the Cross stretched not only over Stephen, but over Saul as well – already shaping a future conversion that would shake the world. 

Scripture tells us that Stephen’s final words were not words of accusation, but of mercy: “And falling on his knees, he cried with a loud voice, saying, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge … ” (Acts 7:59). 

That prayer did not vanish into the air. It fell like seed. It lodged itself – mysteriously, silently – in the soul of Saul. And in God’s time, that seed helped to break open the hardest ground. When the world sees only loss, God is already preparing conversion. When the world sees only the Cross, God is already preparing resurrection. And that truth is already present at the manger. 

The Child wrapped in swaddling clothes is already wrapped in the shadow of the Cross. The straw that cushions Him now will one day give way to wood that pierces. And yet – from that suffering will come salvation, mercy, and the turning of hearts we never thought could change.  

This is why Christmas is not fragile – it is fearless! Because the Incarnation does not retreat from darkness. It enters it.  

So let us not ask for a faith that costs us nothing. Let us ask for a faith that can change the world – starting with our own hearts. 

May we kneel at the manger knowing what it leads to. May we stand at the Cross trusting what God can still bring from it. And may we never forget that even now – especially now – God is at work in ways we cannot yet see.  

The shadow over the manger is not the end of the story. It is the beginning! 

May Almighty God bless you, 

The Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost. 

Amen. 

Bishop Joseph E. Strickland 

Bishop Emeritus