His Beatitude Onuphry addresses Ukrainians with Christmas greeting
The Primate of the UOC recalled Christmas as a feast of peace and of God’s good pleasure in years of trial.
On Christmas Eve of 2026, the Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, His Beatitude Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine Onuphry, addressed the faithful with a Christmas greeting. The text of the address was published by the UOC press service.
In his message, His Beatitude Onuphry recalled that for the fourth year in a row Ukrainians have been meeting the Nativity of Christ in the conditions of war – to the sound of gunfire and in an atmosphere of anxiety. The Primate emphasized that, despite all that is happening, Christians preserve hope and faith that nothing can separate a person from the love of God.
We present the full text of the address below.
Christ is born – glorify Him,
Christ comes from Heaven – go out to meet Him,
Sing to the Lord, all the earth.
(Irmos of the Canon of the Nativity of Christ)
I greet you all from my heart – God-loving hierarchs and pastors, devout monks and nuns, dear brothers and sisters – with the great, world-saving feast of the Nativity according to the flesh of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ.
For the fourth year in a row we greet the Nativity of Christ, the feast of God’s peace and good pleasure, to the sound of deadly gunfire, and we fervently pray that the Lord will bring peace to the hearts of those waging war against us.
Yet no one and nothing can separate us from the love of God (Rom. 8:39). With joy we meet the feast of the Nativity of Christ and in prayer glorify the great mystery of godliness – God manifested in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16).
In these sacred days, there rises before the eyes of our mind once more the radiant and mysterious story of how, for us men and for our salvation, the Pre-eternal God came down to earth.
Those who even in Paradise sinned against God, who fell away from God and turned aside from Divine love, awaited with longing the moment when Divine love would return to them. Humanity knew that the Messiah must come upon the earth, laid waste by sin – the One Who would cleanse and sanctify the whole world and restore to mankind the Paradise that had been lost. And this mystery was fulfilled. The Son of God, the Second Hypostasis of the Holy, Life-giving Trinity, the Creator of all things visible and invisible, comes to earth in the image of man.
The Lord was born in a poor cave in Bethlehem, where shepherds, in foul weather, drove their livestock. The Mother of God, the Most Pure Virgin Mary, wrapped the Divine Infant Christ in swaddling cloths and laid Him in a manger, marveling that the King of kings, the Creator of the universe – before Whom the Angels in Heaven stand with fear and serve with trembling – willed to accomplish the mystery of His coming into the world in utter poverty and simplicity.
The holy Angels beheld with reverent awe the depth and majesty of Divine love. They hovered above the blessed cave and sang a wondrous hymn: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, in men good pleasure” (Luke 2:14). The Angel of God appeared to the shepherds who were nearby keeping watch over their flocks, and the glory of God shone round about them. The shepherds were afraid, but the Angel comforted them and said: “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you glad tidings of great joy which shall be to all people – for unto you is born this day… in the city of David a Savior, Who is Christ the Lord; and this will be a sign unto you: you shall find the Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger” (Luke 2:9–12). The shepherds hastened to the blessed cave and indeed found there the Divine Infant Christ, swaddled and lying in the manger, and they bowed down before Him. And the shepherds told the Most Holy Virgin Mary and Joseph the Betrothed, who was the earthly Guardian Angel of the Most Holy Virgin, all that the Angel had proclaimed to them.
After the shepherds, on that same first day, three Magi came to worship the Divine Child. The Magi were eastern kings and learned sages who likewise awaited the coming of the Messiah into the world. Seeking to comprehend the time and the power of His advent, they devoted themselves to the study of the heavenly luminaries. And behold – at one and the same time, the Magi, each independently of the others, saw in the heavens a wondrous star, and they understood that the mystery of God’s coming into the world had been accomplished. Each, independently, set out after the star, which led them to Jerusalem. There they met one another and together went to King Herod, to render him honor as an earthly king; and from Herod the star led them to Bethlehem and stood above the blessed cave where the Messiah Christ was born. With fear and reverent awe, the Magi bowed down before the Divine Infant Christ and offered Him gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Gold – as to the King of eternal glory; frankincense – as to the High Priest of the good things to come (Heb. 9:11); and myrrh – as a sign that Christ the High Priest will Himself offer Himself in sacrifice for the salvation of mankind.
But Herod, that crafty man, hearing from the Magi that an eternal King had been born into the world, was troubled and devised to slay the Divine Infant Christ. Yet the Angel of God revealed this in a dream to Joseph the Betrothed and commanded the Holy Family to flee into Egypt. Thus did human malice meet God upon the earth with ingratitude. And yet no malice and no pride could conquer life. The Divine Infant Christ dwelt for several years in Egypt, cast down idols, and blessed the land of Egypt; and after the death of Herod, according to the word of the Angel, He returned once more to Judea – where the great sacrifice of Divine Love was accomplished, for the sake of which God came down to earth.
Divine Love has conquered human malice and sin. The Savior’s struggle against evil was great and prolonged, and in it the Lord teaches us, His people, how we can and must resist sin: if possible, to flee from sin, as the Divine Infant fled from wicked Herod into Egypt; and if it is not possible to flee, then to endure with courage the weaknesses, infirmities, and shortcomings of men, as Christ the Savior did during His earthly life and His Messianic ministry. At times the Lord said to people: “O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you and bear with you?” (Luke 9:41); and at times He rebuked crafty sinners and said: “Serpents, brood of vipers, how will you escape the condemnation of Gehenna?” (Matt. 23:33). Yet the Lord bore with all and endured all, and in response to human evil He did only good for mankind: He stilled the elements, fed the hungry, healed the sick, and raised the dead.
Truly, in the Old Testament as well the best of the sons of men resisted evil in like manner. Thus Joseph the Fair, who was tempted by the wife of an Egyptian courtier, tore himself away from her and, leaving his garment in her hands, fled from sin. Righteous Lot, who lived in Sodom where extreme lawlessness was practiced, was tormented in his soul, yet he endured all, preserving his moral purity and chastity. In this, seemingly similar resistance to sin in the Old and the New Testaments, there is one most important difference: the righteous of the Old Testament resisted evil, yet were unable to overcome it; but Christ the Savior withstood evil – and overcame it, destroying it through His sufferings on the Cross. Christ the Savior has granted to us also the power to conquer evil, and the Lord has taught us how this is to be done. Evil, as Holy Scripture says, is overcome by good (Rom. 12:21). If we will love God, our Creator and Maker, and will love people, whatever they may be toward us – kind or ill-disposed – then we shall be able not only to resist evil and sin, but also to conquer them.
Once again I greet you, dear brothers and sisters, with the Nativity of Christ – with the feast of God’s peace and good pleasure, with the great day of the union of Heaven and earth. May each of us, through a patient and pious life, become a partaker of that great grace which the Son of God, our Savior and Lord, has brought down to earth – the grace that renewed the world, that bestowed upon mankind a joyful hope and spiritual strength to overcome every sin and every evil.
May each of us find his own wondrous star, leading to the cave of Bethlehem, where the bright beginning of the Divine mystery of our salvation was set, where the Pre-eternal God, the Creator of man, appeared in the image of man. The Star of Bethlehem, as Saint Ephraim the Syrian says, appeared… through the Magi to all creation, so that from that star… they might learn to place their hope in God, Who came down to men to show them the way into His Kingdom (Works, Vol. 8. Holy Trinity–St. Sergius Lavra: “Otchiy Dom” Publishing House, 1995, p. 44).
I sincerely wish everyone health, joy, peace, and eternal salvation in Christ.
A blessed Nativity of Christ!
Christ is born – glorify Him,
Christ comes from Heaven – go out to meet Him,
Sing to the Lord, all the earth. Amen.
Humbly,
* Onuphry
Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine
The Nativity of Christ, 2025/2026
Kyiv
Earlier, UOJ reported that Orthodox Christians had entered upon Christmas Eve.
