The Archbishop of Canterbury used his Christmas Day sermon to highlight the suffering of children caught up in the Israel-Hamas war.
Referring to Jesus Christ’s birthplace, which is now in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the Most Rev Justin Welby said “the skies of Bethlehem are full of fear rather than angels and glory”.
Welby compared the turbulent conditions of Jesus’s birth with the modern-day plight of children in the troubled region.
In his sermon at Canterbury Cathedral he said: “Today a crying child is in a manger somewhere in the world, nobody willing or able to help his parents who desperately need shelter. Or in an incubator, in a hospital low on electricity, like Al-Ahli (hospital) in Gaza, surrounded by conflict.
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“Maybe he lies in a house that still bears the marks of the horrors of October 7, with family members killed, and a mother who feared for her life.”
Referring to Ukraine and Sudan, the Archbishop continued: “So many parts of the world seem beset with violence.”
He said that a commitment to “serving, not in being served” was needed to resolve problems of climate change, terrorism, economic inequality and “the desperation and ambitions that drive more and more to migration”.
Jesus “confronts our cruelty with his compassion” and “responds to our selfishness with service”, Welby said.
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The Archbishop conducted the Coronation of the King and he suggested Charles is following the example of Jesus in providing leadership through service.
“Two thousand years later, at a Coronation, it seemed natural and right for a king in royal robes to answer a child, ‘I come not to be served, but to serve’ – and we know it to be his intention, the right way to be a king.”
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