Baptist Observer Indianapolis, Indiana

We have a conviction that the friendship and good will of Christmas need not fade into commonplace sordidness, and that the lilting and exuberance of "A happy New Year" could be perpetuated all the Year and everywhere, if we determined that it should be. Happiness and good will are not cosmopolitan but individual virtues, and are limited to men and women who have caught the true spirit of Christmas through their association with God and his Son, Jesus Christ.

When the glory of heaven shone over Bethlehem and the angel brought "good tidings of great joy," only a handful of shepherds saw the light and heard the good news. When "his star" shone brightly in the eastern sky, only a few wise men, say three or four, were wise enough to divine its meaning and follow it to the infant Jesus. All the rest of the world went on in its sordid way and neither knew nor cared that the greatest event in human history was transpiring in a little corner of the universe.

Christian people today have a challenging opportunity, and a corresponding responsibility, to perpetuate the Christmas joy and felicity and the happiness of the new year for the entire year and beyond. They have the message that the world needs. They possess the power to regenerate the human race. They have seen the star and have heard the message of the angels.... They know God and the Christ, whom He has sent. They have been born again from above.

Colonist British Columbia, Canada

Christmas, with its reassurance that a Saviour was born to mankind, and that his way is as open now as ever it was, comes as needed balm to a nerve-taut world. It is the old, the simple story of love applied to the dealings of mankind, instead of hatred; of good will, in place of ill will; of submission to God first, so that man may find his true place in the haven made for him by his Creator.

There is the eternal message of Christmas, which centuries have only sharpened into focus, so that all may see and understand.

The Right Rev. Henry St. George Tucker Burbank Review, California

For Christians who understand the real significance of Christmas there is no reason for discouragement. Even on the human level we were warned by our leaders that victory in war would mean not achievement of peace but rather opportunity to win it. As Christians we know that only through him whose entry into human life we celebrate on Christmas Day can we win a peace which is worthy of the name. "Peace I leave with you my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you." The peace which we have at present is the kind that the world giveth. Like all of this world's gifts it is unstable, impermanent, and unsatisfying. Christmas, however, brings us the assurance that in and through Christ we can transform this imperfect peace into that peace on earth which is promised to men of good will.

The fields are already white unto harvest. Shall we not on this Christmas resolve to put ourselves and our resources at God's disposal that He may send forth laborers into His harvest?

The Rev. Dr. Whitcomb Brougher as quoted in The Boston Daily Globe Massachusetts

The heart of Christmas is love. "God so loved... that he gave his only begotten Son."' Christ [Jesus'] birth was an expression of God's love. Love always gives.

God's Christmas gift to mankind was not money. He gave that which would meet the needs of the soul.

In giving Christ to the world, God gave to mankind a Saviour from selfishness and the power of evil. In carrying out God's spirit of love and good will, Christ gave forgiveness and comfort, inspiration and help, faith and hope,... power to be and to do what each one was created to be and to do.

Dr. James Reid British Weekly, London, England

Millions still live in the darkness because the darkness is in themselves. They continue to dwell in confusion, fettered by illusions and imprisoned in the fears and doubts of their own unlit minds. They are like blind men groping in the sunlight. For, since Christ has come, the light is up, the light that unveils reality. The dawn has broken; the darkness is past.

Mark R. Byers Wausau Daily Record Herald, Wisconsin

Year after year we prove to ourselves that in the only season in which we really try out practical Christianity and its rules for living —or a substantial part of them— the thing actually works.

Christmas is, above all, the season in which most of the western world gives the Golden Rule a good workout. We try to do unto others as we would be done by, forget old enmities and embrace a measure of tolerance—and find out that not only ourselves but all around us, the whole of Christendom, in fact, have a season of unabashed happiness. It is strange that this lesson doesn't sink in deeper than it ever has. It should put the quietus on the cynical and those of little faith —either in themselves, in mankind at large, or in the things of the spirit.

Do you remember St. Matthew's story of St. Peter, who was bidden by Christ Jesus to walk to him across the water, but became afraid and began to sink in the stormy waves? Christ [Jesus] stretched out his hand to him, and his fear vanished and his faith returned—and he walked on the water.

Something like that is the matter with us. We are afraid to live like Christians except for the traditional period of the holidays. And as our fears return our faith dims and we begin to sink into the old ways of selfishness and grasping.

But had we faith sufficient, without any miracle at all we could prolong the millennial peace of the Christmas season into the veritable kingdom of heaven.

John Haynes Holmes Progressive, Madison, Wisconsin

One thing is certain that without the Christ-spirit we can do nothing! Without it we can get no peace under any political system or in any economic order. Without it we can never bring about disarmament, or organize world government, or outlaw the atomic bomb.

Even if we could accomplish these things, they would not work; they would inevitably break down without this blessed spirit to control and guide.

Jesus' vision was as clear as his pity was profound when he wept over Jerusalem, and said, "If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes."

Our plight would indeed be desperate if we knew not what to do, or how to do it. But we do know! The way is here before our very eyes, here beneath our very feet. Every Christmas marks it afresh for us to follow if we will hat we need is only a new baptism of courage to nerve us to resolve and action and therewith bear us to the goal.

This is the deeper meaning of the Christmastide, which is not a rite to be observed, but a spirit in which to live. Here is the glory of this day, which brings us the answer to every question and the cure of every ill. The inmost core of reality, after all, is spirit—and this spirit is revealed in all its radiance and power in Christ [Jesus] and in the prophets and apostles, the saints and seers, who have been since the beginning of the world.

This is no dream—what the spirit of perfect love can do! It is the truth—the simple truth! For the conquerors have come and gone, and the sword has been lifted only to fall and fail, but the spirit endures and triumphs.