GOD HIMSELF IS HAPPY TODAY WITH OUR JOYS AND IS SUFFERING FROM OUR PAINS" - THE HEAD OF THE UGCC ON THE OCCASION OF CHRISTMAS

The holiday of Christmas - is the holiday of human closeness to God. It is the celebration of the Incarnation, for eternal almighty God, incarnated to the person becomes visible, fragile and humanly weak. This year we celebrate Christmas in dramatic circumstances of war, when we have to fight for our freedom and independence of Ukrainian state. We celebrate Christmas Day at a time when many Ukrainian are resettled from their homes, when our soldiers with their chests protect our lives and there are many wounded and those suffering from hunger and cold. The Head of the Church believes that the Savior is present in the lives of those who "now feel sorrow", that is why he replaces it with joy: "He is now a force for the weak, a hope for the hopeless. Such internal closeness of man to God in dramatic circumstances is the meaning of Christmas Joy 2015".  The Primate of the Church believes that we need to re-think and understand the meaning of the Christmas holiday: "For example, during the year we have often felt that not everyone can achieve on his own, because there is a limit of human suffering, life and death. We feel that we need salvation, because we cannot save ourselves on our own. The meaning of Christmas is that our Savior is coming here!" His Beatitude Sviatoslav recalled the testimony of one soldier from ATO, who returning from the front, was going with a friend, who was a disbeliever. At the front, the latter felt the limit of his own efforts and God's salvation. This warrior returned with the words: "Yet there is one!" "This someone" today reveals to us as Jesus Christ - the incarnated God, the Savior of the world" – emphasized the Head of the UGCC. Finally, the Primate of the UGCC encouraged all the big and small to carol, because carols – is the simple and profound way of celebration of the sacrament incarnation of God. "I invite all to contemplate the words of carols, because we carol to proclaim the joy to all who are near, that the God is with us. So let us carol and hurry with the carols to others. So hurry yourself to carol and carol with others. Then together we will feel that we are strong, singing our Savior’s praises. Let’s carol and discover for us and those around us, the Almighty God, the born Savior".