In the days after Christmas we read from the first epistle of St. John. He starts off the epistle reminding his readers (us) that he is talking about what he has seen, what he has heard, what he has touched. The presence of God in the world with the coming of Jesus is not theoretical but something concrete, something grounded in reality. At the same time St. John issues as warning: “Do not love the world or the things of the world.” Here is the tension that believers must navigate in life: on the one hand because of the incarnation the world is charged with the presence of God. On the other hand, the “world” is hostile to God and the things of God.
