December 2025 Magazine Letter

There is a moment each Christmas when the world seems to soften. Lights glow in our windows, familiar carols return, and we feel grateful for the warmth of our homes and the people who fill them. It is good to cherish these blessings; they are gifts. And yet the Christmas story also widens our gaze far beyond our doorstep.

The Christ-child was born into a world of displacement, uncertainty, and political tension. The Holy Family knew what it was to be pushed to the margins, to flee danger, to rely on the kindness of strangers. As we give thanks for all we enjoy, we hold in our hearts those for whom “home” has been bombed away, sometimes year after year the families who enter this season with grief, fear, or nowhere safe to rest.

Christmas does not invite us into guilt, but into compassion: the steady, courageous commitment not to give up, not to grow numb or lethargic, but to help where we can and pray where we cannot. The God who came among us in vulnerability calls us to notice vulnerability wherever it appears.

May Christ’s light warm your home, deepen your gratitude, and strengthen your resolve to be a bearer of hope in this aching world.

A peaceful and compassionate Christmas to you,

Revd Silke