Gospel Reading: Luke 2: 41 -52

Dear Community of Christians,

Who doesn't know about Russian dolls, where one can lift several small identical dolls out of each other? What a pleasure to take smaller ones, little by little, out of a slightly bigger one. This is a picture of the archetype of our humanity, the archetype of the members of our being as they interlock and make our life on earth possible. If, of course, one of those members of our being is not fully developed, they may not ‘fit together’. Life in a physical body becomes very difficult.

The Luke Jesus child radiated an incredible fullness of love and innocence into the world, but because of this innocence he was not equipped for practical life.

After returning from Egypt, the parents of the Matthew child also settled in Nazareth. Rudolf Steiner's spiritual science conveys to us that both children became very close friends.

The sacrificial power of the Matthew child grew out of this love-borne friendship.  He wanted to give the Luke child everything he could, his wisdom, his knowledge of the world, his forces of will, so that this Luke child could fulfil his earthly task.

Today, many children are born with their members of being fully integrated, like we see in the neatly stacked Russian dolls. But by no means all. In particular, these special children need our love and attention. For this is the goal of earthly life, that all people can prepare and purify the members of their organization so that our ‘I am’, our highest spiritual being, can sit at the centre of our being, much like the tiniest of the Russian dolls.

Gospel Reading: Matthew 2: 1-12

Dear Community of Christians,

​If we have been awake as citizens, all over the world we have been able to experience many Herod’s. Figures that in everyday life are courteous and obliging, but at the same time secretly considering other, perhaps evil, thoughts.

Are we human beings helplessly at the mercy of such powers which work through human beings?

Finally, the three kings find their way to the child through the advice of Herod and, of course, also through the star. Can this too encourage us? The path to the child, the youngest part of our personality, which we have to develop in the here and now, is not possible without guidance through a path full of stones and obstacles. They come from our inner weaknesses. Herod is present in each of us inwardly. And the obstacles come as well from without. Our development as an independent thinking person can be prevented by external restrictions.

A dream saved the wise men from returning to Herod. Doesn't this show the importance of being much more awake in the future, including what we bring with us from the night and listening to our inner voice? Then the evil of the Herodian powers can only harm us as much as we allow them to do.

Dear Community of Christians,

Our recent past shows that the tragedy of science is the struggle for the only correct truth. For many people, scientists are, so to speak, wise men. It is commonly perceived that they alone know the right thing.

In fact, there once were genuinely wise men in the past. They knew the power and importance of their knowledge, and that it was not their personal possession. Therefore, there was no question for them; to give certain gifts, qualities to a higher principle. They recognized the limits of their personal possibilities of action. It was necessary for the three wise men giving their precious gifts, developed over long periods of time, to the one who will make these gifts fruitful for humanity in a much higher sense. For them it was a gesture of inner necessity. It was an act of selflessness whose example reaches into our time. And which was then immeasurably exalted by the sacrifice of Christ.

Science of today, which believes itself to be in exclusive possession of the indispensable truth and indoctrinates society with it, needs above all the power of sacrifice, or we can also say selflessness, for the future.

Gospel Reading: Luke 2: 25-35 and 39-40

Dear Community of Christians,

The new year will confront us with diverse events and challenges. Regardless of what we will experience, we could inscribe something like a yearly motif for the coming months in our own souls.

In view of the attacks of evil on the human soul and mind, could be this our most important impulse be to have "Christ in me", in my soul, always present. "Healing is done through you," says our Christmas epistle. We may not feel or experience the healing power of Christ, but it is nevertheless present.

​The organ we need for this perception is already predisposed and effective, but often we do not pay enough attention to our experiences. Sometimes, when we are in great need, we experience a special help, but we are usually not able to make the connection to the healing power of Christ. Since the year is still very young, we could give as much attention as possible to this motif, the healing power of Christ, and this could become effective like a shield against the attacks of the evil one.

Gospel Reading: ​John 21: 15–25 

Dear Community of Christians,

In the presentation of the child Jesus in the temple we meet two people: Hanna the very old widow and Simeon the most pious person in the land. When Hanna saw the child, she recognized the appearance of his heavenly splendor and even foresees the salvation for the world will come from this child.

And also, Simeon, saw the clear purity and the divine appearance of this child.

Why we are told in detail about the encounter of these two people with this child? With this encounter we can unmistakably recognizes that an old world, without strength for the future, meets the new impulse that will renew the world.

In the individual and in the view of humanity as a whole, growing old is inevitable. Because we have used up our physical strength, never can our physical childhood and youth powers retrieve.

And yet today we can experience many rejuvenation forces in the old grown humanity. This child has prepared a vessel for the rejuvenating powers of Christ to enter into the earthly physical world.

​Whoever can fully absorb the powers of Christ becomes, like this child, a vessel for the renewing powers of a humanity that has grown old. Only by absorbing the all-pervading, rejuvenating Christ forces can humanity, prevent that the sacrifice of Jesus Christ from having been made in vain.   

Gospel Reading: John 21: 15–25 

Dear Community of Christians,

John the Gospel writer mentions clearly, his testimony is the truth. At a time when the world is struggling for truth, no Christian will deny the truth of the Gospel of John. And so, his important last words in the Gospel are of all the other things that Jesus Christ did, that would be written down in books one after another, the world cannot take in those books.

A mysterious word. 

But when we are deeply imbued with the truth that Christ is present in all human hearts since the resurrection, the word loses its mysteriousness. 

Today we can look back over 2000 years on a large scale and recognize the unbelievably great works that have been accomplished by people in word and writing. Here is just one representative of the many who, with and through Christ in their hearts, have handed over their works to the world of live for the earth.

In the time of the cruelest racial persecution in USA, Martin Luther King called out to the people:

"Love must guide our actions. Throughout the centuries, the words of Jesus should echo in our hearts today. Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, pray for those who insult and persecute you. If we fail to do this, our protest will end up like a meaningless drama on the world stage of history and the memory of it will be wrapped in the ugly garment of shame”. 

Those words are written in the live sphere of the earth.

And so, for the future every single person can take part in writing, through the deeds, in word and action, the books that will fill the world through and with Jesus Christ.

Gospel Reading: Matthew 1: 1–25

Dear Community of Christians,

Let us imagine an angel appears in our midst at this very hour.

We would be shaken to the core.

We would experience total confusion.

Yet which message would the angel want to tell us? Are we prepared to hear it?

​With certainty, the angel brings the message that the Christ power approaches the earth again with the overflowing of light and love. It is the Grace of the open Cosmos of the Holy Night. Even when we don’t see or hear the angel’s message, it surrounds the earth. Whatever we experience; love, compassion, fervency, is the Angels’ message and mystery during this Holy Night. That is what can accompany us through the year.

​Gospel Reading: Luke 21: 25-36

Dear Community of Christians,

Has it become real in these last 2 years that we understand the Apocalypse words much more concretely?

As the Gospel says: "And human beings will lose their heads for fear and expectation of what is breaking in upon the whole earth.”

Fear and anxiety have paralyzed the whole world. On the surface, it was the fear of getting sick by contracting a virus. But behind this fear of illness lies the ultimate fear of death. This fear is a primal one, living more or less intensely in every human soul. It is important to admit this. This begins a crucial process of self-discovery.

​Perhaps in the course of acquiring self-knowledge we discover that we have no clear idea what happens after we die. With our everyday selves we have a completely buried awareness of it. We have actually lost the knowledge that this world of death, and that which exists beyond it, is a realm to which we human beings belong to whole on earth. When we have lost of our trust, our clear consciousness of the spiritual world. Our thoughts are bound to the material which brings about a second crucifixion of the Christ in the spiritual world. Advent is a time for reflection. We could fill it with questions about the knowledge of man and his place in the cosmos, questions for Anthroposophy, a living being from which answers might come.

A deep certainty can arise through this process of reflection that the world of the spirit, the world into which we enter with death, is filled with light, love and life-giving power. Thus prepared, we will be strengthened to "escape all that lies ahead without harm and be able to stand before the revealing Son of Man".

 Gospel Reading: 1. Thessalonians 5: 1-11 and 23-24

Dear Community of Christians,

The letters by Paul the Apostle are Christian testimonies from the first human being fully imbued with the power of Christ. His soul-awakening words are imbued with the deep knowledge that with the Christ mystery, the spiritual sun power has entered into the earth. From now on, this sun power can shine as an individual sun in every single human heart. But it can only happen if we go through our life truly awake, and not asleep.

With the lofty, spiritual goal that Paul puts before the eyes of the Thessalonians, one has to ask how can it ever be achieved by us materialistically inclined people.

​Different personalities in many different cultures of the recent past have shown us that it is possible.

What distinguishes them is a pronounced self-discipline, their willingness to walk a path of practice, and to wrest this path from an often-difficult destiny. Through Rudolf Steiner’s words we can say of such a path of practice that “ideas become ideals and out of this activity lifeforces will be created”.

Then it becomes possible to do the good for the sake of the good. Such extraordinary people have wrested their steeled willpower from their weakness; they did not spend their lives sleeping and or dreaming. In contrast to being attracted by the evil in the world, it can be a help to look up to such outstanding personalities who have walked their lives fully awake with consciousness.

Gospel Reading: ​Luke 21 :25- 36

Dear Community of Christians,

Adventus in Latin is translated Arrival. Could it be also said: the coming? Coming could mean a new day, a new chance, a new guest arriving, because it is expected.

But it could also mean bad news, an uninvited guest, or even trouble is coming our way. Of the first we have a clear knowledge; the second we suspect, or are fearful of. Both have to do with the certainty it will come towards us. Who puts the obscuring veil over the unexpected part of what is coming? Is it our consciousness itself that is not ready to see the reality of the world or fails to take seriously enough?

Our Gospel reading in Advent has an apocalyptic character. The text points to the signs that should make us aware of the apocalyptic character of our time. Do we have a clear awareness of these signs by now?

Within the human being, the fear of death is a clear sign of our distance and our lack of understanding of the working of the cosmos.

Within society, we find the sign of unquestioning followers to material laws; that ignore the working of the spiritual. These facts must be accepted.

What remains as a task is to connect with the spiritual world again and again on a personal level. To find where the spirituality shines in small things, and in the community between people, and thus gives strength and security. And everything that than comes towards us, bad or good, can be welcomed.