Sunday, December 27, 2026
Liturgical Color: White/Gold
The First Sunday of Christmas
Almighty God, you have poured upon us the new light of your incarnate Word: Grant that this light, kindled in our hearts, may shine forth in our lives; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
Christmas
Because you gave Jesus Christ, your only Son, to be born for us; who, by the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary his mother, was made truly man, yet without the stain of sin, that we might be cleansed from sin and given the right to become your children.
Apostle and Evangelist
Red Letter Day
John, called the Beloved Disciple, leaned on the Lord's breast at the Last Supper and stood beneath the cross to receive his mother into his keeping. The church remembers him as the witness behind the Fourth Gospel, the Johannine letters, and the Apocalypse. His feast falls December 27, in the octave of the Lord's nativity.
John was a son of Zebedee and brother of James, called with his brother from their fishing boat to follow Jesus (Mark 1:19–20). With Peter and James, he belonged to the inner circle present at the Transfiguration (Mark 9:2), the raising of Jairus's daughter (Mark 5:37), and Gethsemane (Mark 14:33). He and James were surnamed Boanerges, 'Sons of Thunder' (Mark 3:17).
In the Fourth Gospel, a figure identified only as 'the disciple whom Jesus loved' reclines next to Jesus at the Last Supper (John 13:23), stands at the cross (19:26–27), outruns Peter to the empty tomb (20:2–8), and recognizes the risen Lord at the Sea of Tiberias (21:7). The Gospel itself identifies this disciple as its authority (21:24). Traditional identification of the Beloved Disciple with John son of Zebedee is early (Irenaeus) but debated by modern scholarship.
Paul lists 'James, Cephas, and John' as 'pillars' of the Jerusalem church (Galatians 2:9). Acts pairs John with Peter in the early Jerusalem ministry (Acts 3–4, 8:14). After Acts 8, the canonical record is silent.
Traditionally, John settled in Ephesus after the fall of Jerusalem (70) and lived to extreme old age, dying a natural death during the reign of Trajan (98–117). This tradition rests on a remarkably strong chain of testimony: Irenaeus of Lyon (c. 180) claims to have heard Polycarp of Smyrna speak of his personal acquaintance with John, placing John in Asia Minor within living memory. Eusebius preserves additional traditions: Jerome reports that the aged John, too frail to preach, was carried into the assembly and repeated the words 'Little children, love one another.' Tertullian reports that John was plunged into boiling oil at Rome and survived unharmed before being exiled to Patmos — a tradition without earlier attestation.