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1st January 2026 – Solemnity of the Mother of God
Today is the eighth day after Christmas, and Jesus receives His name.
Today is also the first day of the civil year and we receive a blessing.
We like the blessing of old, the venerable words given by Moses to bless the people of God:
“The Lord bless you and keep you.
The Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you.
The Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.”
These words meet the deepest desire of our heart: to be blessed by our Creator, to be considered by Him, to find a shelter in His loving gaze, and to be kept in the embrace of His mercy. We thirst for this fatherly blessing, this good word pronounced upon us as a confirmation of the good word which created us. God spoke a word, and there was life. This was a word of blessing, a good word for a good life. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him in love.” (Eph 1:3-4). On the first day of the year, we are grateful to allow this primordial blessing to resonate in our lives and in our world. God is the source of blessing. He is the wellspring of peace. Peace comes from Him. Peace on earth is the blessing of Christmas, when Jesus was incarnate, when the Word was made flesh. Blessed be the Father who opened for us the wellspring of all blessings!
The Word of God, who was in the beginning, is Himself the eternal blessing which contains all that is good in the world. The Son of Mary is a blessing for our world. Moreover, His presence among us is the definitive blessing of our creation, God’s Yes to the world He created. We heard in the Martyrology of Christmas these beautiful words: Jesus Christus, æternus Deus æternique Patris Filius, mundum volens adventu suo piissimo consecrare ; we can translate broadly: “Jesus Christ, eternal God and Son of the Eternal Father, was made flesh out of His desire to consecrate the world by His very kind / bounteous coming among us”. The blessing of Christmas, which is Jesus Himself with His unfathomable goodness and kindness towards us, is confirmed for us today. We celebrate Mary, the Mother of God, who gives us Jesus, and with Him all blessing coming from the Father on our world in need of salvation.
No surprise, then, that today the Child born from Mary receives His name. On the eighth day, He is circumcised, thus made a full member of the People of God, and He receives the name Jesus. We already knew His name Emmanuel, the sweet name of His presence among us: ‘God-with-us’. Now, He is officially called Jesus, which means: ‘God saves’. This is a name of blessing. Jesus circumcised in His flesh already pours out the Blood He has come to pour out on the Cross for us and for our salvation. The blessing and the blood of salvation go together. We could as well say that the Blessed Son of God takes on for us a terrible and dreadful name, as St Paul explains: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us – for it is written: Cursed be every one who hangs on a tree – so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles, that we might receive the promise of the Holy Spirit through faith.” (Ga 3:13-14). He saves us by dying for us. He blesses us by taking upon Himself the curse we incur because of our sinfulness. His cross is the seal of His blessing – just as the priest blesses us with the sign of the Cross. By His resurrection, He opens the way for the ultimate blessing of the Father, that is the gift of the Holy Spirit sent into our hearts and crying: ‘Abba, Father’! (Ga 4:6).
Today we receive as a blessing the great and noble, dreadful and divine name of Jesus. “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” (Ac 4:12). This name was announced separately to Joseph (according to St Matthew) and to Mary (according to St Luke). It is by being Jesus that the Son of God is our Emmanuel. He is God with us even in our sinfulness, not to condone it, but to save us from it and to restore us to the full dignity of the Children of God.
Let us today invite Joseph and Mary to pronounce upon us the name of their child, Jesus, the Son of the Father. They, too, are with us; they keep us in their prayers, in their constant intercession on behalf of the children of God. We enter the New Year rooted in the kindness and the blessing which is contained in the names of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. We keep them in the silence of our hearts. By them, we bless the author of all blessing: Our Father in heaven. We bless the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and we let ourselves be blessed and baptised anew in their one Name of Mercy and Love. Amen.