“This is the reason for our joy: we are loved, we are sought for, the Lord seeks us to find us, to love us more,” Pope Francis said during his December 22 general audience. “This is the reason for joy: knowing that we are loved without any merit, we are always loved first by God, with a love so concrete that He took on flesh and came to live in our midst, in that Baby that we see in the crib.”

“This love has a name and a face,” he added: “Jesus is the name and the face of love – this is the foundation of our joy.”