The editors formerly attributed this homily to Saint Leo the Great, as the Ballerini brothers most learnedly note in the preface to his works, page 70, admitting that it should be restored to Saint Maximus. Their judgment rests upon five Vatican codices; namely 4951, page 5 at the back; 1267, page 89 at the back; 453, page 99 on the front; Reginensis 125, page 69 at the back; and Ottobonianus 773; with which agree the Turin codex, homily 13 on the Nativity of the Lord; Vercelli 81; two Novara codices, 27, page 68, and marked I. O, number 11, page 18; Monza E III; the Cistercian codex of Monte Amiata; and finally two Augienses, marked XIII. Alcuin also ascribes it to Maximus, page 26 of the homilies, Venice edition of the year 1571; Gymnicus, page 16; Combefis, volume I, page 207; Cumdius, volume I, page 164; Galesinius, page
90; Raynaudus, page 194; Margarinus in the Bibliotheca Maxima, Lyons edition of 1677, volume VI, page 5—confirm the same. But who would think otherwise, when there is so great a consensus of codices and of writers? Most justly, brethren, at the coming festival of this day the whole world everywhere rouses itself to all joy, because today has arisen for the whole earth the judge promised from the ages, and the redeemer. And it is necessary that all of us in common, who have received the saving faith of the future examination and the promised resurrection, should indeed have fear of the judge, but joy of the redeemer. For every faithful soul is corrected by fear, and by correction is made glad.
And in this, dearest ones, how great is the dispensation of the almighty Father toward the human race, and how great the kindness, that him whom he was preparing as judge for the unbelieving, this same one he sent ahead as redeemer for those who would believe—so that mercy, running ahead, might forestall the severity of the coming judge. Today, therefore, Christ is born; but in his nativity the life of us all has its birthday, because we who lost the privileges of our first nativity, being visited by Christ, return to life by a holier birth. Today Mary bore, but she bore her own author by her childbearing. Today she brought forth into the world a man whom she did not receive from man. What miracle is this, brethren?
Flesh is born of flesh, yet not begotten through flesh, and by a certain secret and incomprehensible conception a divine offspring proceeds from a mortal woman. Nor indeed is it any wonder if a divine nativity took place where there was no human conception, or if that childbirth did not violate the mother whom no intercourse had defiled. He of old, foreknowing things to come, Isaiah, opening to the peoples and nations the sign of a new salvation, said: Behold, a virgin shall conceive in her womb and shall bear a Son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which is interpreted, God with us (Isaiah 7). And that we may observe that there is one consent and one counsel of the New and Old Testament, the most blessed Luke, the excellent narrator of the Lord's generation, also says:
The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, and he said to her: Behold, you shall conceive in your womb, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Jesus (Luke 1). Now Jesus, dearest ones, in the Latin tongue is called Savior. Behold how the divine testimonies confirm one another by sentences that agree; and though the times of the proclaimers are different, the account is not different. For the virgin's childbearing which the one foretold, the other attests. Who then would hesitate over the divinity of Christ, who over the redemption—him whom Isaiah confesses as God and Gabriel announces as Savior?
Who would doubt that the womb of the untouched mother flourished, since with, as it were, one mouth and by the same Spirit the evangelist, the angel, and the prophet declare it? Where there are witnesses so great and so many, the truth does not blush, but the unbelieving hearer is confounded. But now let us see what injuries Christ, born for us, endures, and again with what virtues those injuries are adorned; and above all he allows himself to be conceived by the female sex, he who at the beginning of the world with almighty hand fashioned woman from the male. But this humility of being born the integrity of the virgin mother exalts. And although Christ, born of a woman, is fed with milk as an infant;
yet, as Lord of things, he is nourished at virginal breasts; and as soon as the maternal womb poured him forth into these storms of the age and the bilge of a tossing world, he is wrapped in the meanest swaddling cloths. He is indeed clothed in swaddling cloths for our sake—he who, when he created all things, flooded the lands with light, adorned the heaven with stars, and clothed the sun with fiery brightness. He is indeed swathed in cloths, but these cloths, while a new star shines, are honored with gifts by the Magi and are honored by exulting angels. And that we may know that all these things are either done or spoken through a mystery: this one who is wrapped in cloths, proclaimed from the beginning from the bosom of the Father, has come from heaven, the bridegroom of the saving nuptials from the eternal bridal chamber, as the venerable David says:
He himself, like a bridegroom coming forth from his chamber (Psalm 18). Then (as we read) he is laid in a manger, because, as the evangelist says, There was no room for them in the inn (Luke 2). Let not these things trouble any of you, brethren; all this lowliness in the Savior is the sacrament of our most precious salvation. For see with what great wisdom Christ is said to be laid in a manger—he who by a certain twofold grace was to be both the food and the shepherd of the human race. Rightly is he placed in a manger, that with the bleating of the heavenly Lamb he might invite the flocks of the spiritual sheep to the pastures of everlasting life. There was, it says, no room for them in the inn. Were the confines of that dwelling so narrow that they could not hold the limbs of the little one born in that hour?
But it is therefore recorded in a mystical sense that he found no room in the inn, because Christ, entering the world, did not find faith in which he could rest, as he himself says in the Gospel, saying: But the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head (Matthew 8). Hence we perceive that the only Son of God rests not in spacious houses and gilded ceilings, but in the faith of believers. This Christ Jesus, then, sucking the breasts, wailing after the manner of newborn infants, wrapped in mean swaddling cloths, lying in a manger, the angelic ministries attend, and the whole host of the multitude marvels, praising together with harmonious voice and saying: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will (Luke 2).
Glory indeed to God, who bestowed the gift of eternal salvation on despairing mortals; and peace to men of good will, whom Christ by his own contest and by his own battle called back into his own kingdom from devilish captivity. And how fittingly the evangelical word resounds when it is said: Glory to God in the highest, and peace on earth to men, etc.—because the same Son of God is both glorious among the angels in the heavens and grants peace to men of good will on earth. Wherefore, most beloved, let us rejoice with fitting joys over so great a salvation, and, joining ourselves to the angelic voices, let us ever praise with due honor the mysteries of Christ and his mighty works.