All power and authority are accountable to Him

Christmas, surprisingly enough, is quite political.

In the pagan view of government, the law came from the mouth of the king, and the people counted for nothing. They had no elections, no lobbying, and no opportunity to change the law or those who made it.

But when the Lord Jesus came, He taught that people are called to be sons and daughters of God, and therefore they do count. That is why no public official can dominate or own other people; no legislator or governor, congress or court, can have a veto power over human rights! Thanks to Christmas, everyone counts, and therefore everyone has a voice. Power and authority become service; government becomes representative; legislators become ministers of God (see Romans 13) and are accountable to Him, and issues matter only because people matter more.

This is why we can elect our leaders and lobby them once they are in office. This is why Christians have a political responsibility.

Some still doubt whether the pulpit is the place to talk about elections. But, in fact, if there were no pulpits, neither would there be any elections. In the founding era of America, political sermons were quite normal. It wasn’t that the Church was becoming a political party; it was that the Church was unafraid to apply the Word of God to that aspect of people’s lives that involved government and politics, leadership and power.

We need the same today. When we do so, it is not a sign that the Church is becoming too political, but rather a response to the reality that our politics have become too pagan. It is Christmas that contains the key to changing that.

We are about to begin 2022, a crucial midterm election year. The divisions in politics are not simply about policy, but about principle. They are not about people having different ideas of how to get to the same goal; they are about groups of people with very different, radically incompatible goals.

The moment calls for a recommitment to America itself. We look at the principles in our Declaration – about equality, God-given rights, and the consent of the governed – and realize that it doesn’t get any better than this. No other country is still operating under its original founding documents, and there’s a reason. We can always do better at living our founding principles, but we can’t do better than the principles themselves.

Nor do we find a nation that has more generously welcomed and blessed the world. People come here not because of geography or ethnicity, but because of freedom. When they come, they become Americans in a way that simply doesn’t happen when they go to other countries.

America has blessed the world with her creativity. The light bulb, telephone, personal computer, internet, email, cell phone, and much more have come from America. We are home to the greatest number of Nobel Prize winners – 375 (Great Britain, second in line, produced 131).

America is great. Acknowledging, teaching, preserving, and defending that greatness is not some kind of vice, narrowness, or sinful pride. It’s gratitude to the God who gave us this gift, and it’s a practical application of the Christmas message that we are called to live in this world as sons and daughters of God. That is the great exchange of gifts that lies at the root of all gift- giving at Christmas: God took our human nature upon Himself in the Incarnation, and He gave us a share in His Divine nature by faith and Baptism.

Let us live, then, as faithful citizens both of heaven and of earth!

FATHER FRANK PAVONE is one of the most prominent pro-life leaders in the world. In 1993 he became national director of Priests for Life. He is also the president of the National Pro-life Religious Council and the national pastoral director of the Silent No More Campaign and of Rachel’s Vineyard, the world’s largest ministry of healing after abortion. He has served at the Vatican assisting the Church’s pro-life work under Pope St. John Paul II. More can be found at www.FrFrankPavone.org.