Christmas Morning arrives without its usual costume.
No hush of falling snow.
No white blanket tucking the land into stillness.

And yet—
the fields of upstate New York keep their own liturgy.
Brown grasses bow under a pewter sky.
Stone fences hold the memory of frost.
Bare trees lift their thin fingers like prayers
that do not need adornment to be faithful.

This morning, my heart is full.

It is full of last night—
of carols that found their way into familiar bones,
of an old story told once more
still capable of saving us.
Of candlelight passing hand to hand,
of faces softened by song,
of the holy courage it takes to show up
again and again.

It is full of those who once sat beside us,
whose voices we still hear when the hymns begin.
The saints who taught us where to stand,
how to sing,
when to listen.
They are nearer than they seem this morning,
woven into memory,
wrapped around us like warmth.

It is also full of the world as it is—
not tidy, not finished, not healed.
I hold close the poor and unsheltered,
the hungry and war-torn,
the sick, the lonely, the unloved.
I hold them not with answers,
but with a fierce tenderness,
trusting that compassion itself
is one of God’s intended gifts.

And then there is gratitude—
a deep, swelling gratitude
for the promise this day keeps making.
That light still comes.
That love still risks being born into ordinary places.
That hope does not wait for perfect conditions.

Before the day unwraps with its expectations—
before plans, meals, noise, and movement—
I offer this quiet prayer:
That we meet one another
in love,
and in peace;
that we would recognize the light
when it finds us
without spectacle.

Christ is born again this morning—
in hearts willing to see
unexpected beauty
and to carry it gently
into the waiting world.