Is “Christmas Monday” an Oxymoron?

When I opened my daily book of meditation, I saw “Monday, December 25.”  For a moment I felt a shock of surprise. How could the beautiful Masses I just attended be Monday, such a mundane workaday time in the week? Really? Christmas falling on a Monday? Something about it just didn’t seem right. After a reflective pause, I realized not much of the first Christmas seemed right either. So much of the most famous day of all times (around 4-7 B.C.) was ordinary with a mix of extraordinary. Now that’s an oxymoron! Extraordinary ordinariness. An ordinary feeding trough: the crib for the King of Creation. Workaday shepherds: believers in celestial beings. Messy rafters, dirt floors: Home, Sweet Home for Divinity. From all eternity the Trinity held the Mystery: Divinely Human, Humanly Divine.