The event associated with the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ, the Son of God - - along with bringing the world freedom from sin, what St. Paul calls “the fullness of time had come” - - is the fulfillment of the saving and liberation of people from under the yoke of sin to become the chosen sons of God. That is the meaning of the Birth of Christ. Baby Jesus greeted by shepherds and entrusted with faith to the surprise of his parents brings peace to the world with the power of changing people’s hearts in the grace of salvation, which takes place at the end of his life on the cross. Moses already told his priests to pray for peace and the Lord’s blessing, which now in Jesus are realized. This saving took place through the power of God which He brought through his coming: “Abba Father, so you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son then also an heir through God.” Mary, the mother of Jesus, in this context is in reality the first Christian and daughter of God, by virtue of trusting the will of God and cooperating with it. As noted last week, in the beginning there was no special interest in dating historical facts. The most important was its message. Moreover, even if anyone recorded events of the time, it was regarding some global event of importance for that moment or to that local society. The kinds of events were, for example, the originating of Rome, the rule or death of a particular ruler or king, the beginning of the -- yes sports have always ranked high in importance -- Olympic Games, etc. For the Christians of the first centuries, memorable were the governing of their ruler Diocletian (from the year 284), one of the cruelest persecutors of Christians, it was called the “Era of Diocletionism”. Losing the counting of time from our era of Christ, we are thankful to the Roman monk; Dionesius from Sicily (the year 544). He was one of the most outstanding and learned men of the age, who then Pope John I in the year 526 recommended to work on a new liturgical calendar to celebrate Easter. The calendar of the author Cyril of Alexandria was used till the year 531. Dionesius worked on the next one hundred years. Then he knowingly abandoned the dating diocletian “ungodly persecutors”, and brought in the new era “from the incarnation of the Lord”, which was established in the year 753 with the guidelines of Rome. He gave by this them the following justification: “We chose to begin the counting of years from the Birth of the Lord, our Jesus Christ, so that the beginning of our faith would be more visible and brighter to our people, and a testament of our redemption.” Although this was not known immediately, it was accepted in time thanks mostly to its spreading later by St. Bede the Venerable (735) and become the most popular calendar in the world. And today we celebrate the day January 1, 2012, in our era, or the time after the birth of Christ. Even the dating should remind us that God wants to be with us always and everywhere. Let us remember this on the threshold of this New Year 2012. May God bless us all this New Year. Father Richard