The birth stories of Jesus are narratives, invented stories meant to be read out loud.

In 2014 the story might be read like this.

All over the world there is Pax - Peace – Paix – it means the same in all languages and in all countries … except when the word is translated it means war, famine, refugees, poverty, alienated, oppressed and homeless .. the world in which we are to bring up our children..

Peace means change. Gandhi, King and Mandela created “impossible” change.

General Romeo Dallaire wrote in They Fight Like Soldiers, They Die Like Children; There are no sidelines anymore. Youth do not have twenty years to work out priorities, dreams and passions in the comfort of their milieu. The future is not only very near but one that is within our power to affect. We are entering an era in which evil has no place to hide and there is no limit to how we can present the good.

Malala, at seventeen, spoke at her reception of the Nobel Peace Prize and said; I had two options, one was to remain silent and wait to be killed. And the second was to speak up and then be killed. I chose the second one. I decided to speak up. My answer is always the same, "One child, one teacher, one pen and one book can change the world."

I will continue the fight until I see every child in school. I feel much stronger after the attack that I endured, because I know, no one can stop me, or stop us, because now we are millions, standing up together.

The so-called world of adults may understand, but we children don’t. Why is it that countries which we call "strong" are so powerful in creating wars but so weak in bringing peace? Why is it that giving guns is so easy but giving books is so hard? Why is it that making tanks is so easy, but building schools is so difficult?

Kailash, at the reception of the Nobel Peace Prize spoke and said, I represent here the sound of silence. The cry of innocence. The face of invisibility. I have come here to share the voices and dreams of our children, our children, because they are all our children. I have looked into their frightened and exhausted eyes. And I have heard their urgent questions. There is no greater violence than to deny the dreams of our children. The single aim of my life is that every child is; free to be a child, free to grow and develop, free to eat, sleep, see daylight, free to laugh and cry, free to play, free to learn, free to go to school, and above all, free to dream. I refuse to accept that all the temples and mosques and churches and prayer houses have no place for the dreams of our children.

Mahatma Gandhi said, "If we are to teach real peace in this world... we shall have to begin with the children." I humbly add, let us unite the world through compassion for our children.

Jesus; Let the children come unto me.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Father John Walsh