Accompanying the note of Christmas cheer this year there is a more sombre tone which pervades our celebrations. Our neighbourhoods are haunted by the spectre of violence and the sound of music is drowned out by the sound of gunshots. There is talk of gun amnesties, of taking back the streets and of 30-day ceasefires. This is not the Watts district of Los Angeles of a generation ago. It is not Afghanistan today. This is Bermuda! Once more our teacup is like a stormy sea.

Add to this the grinding sounds of an economy which is ceasing to hum along. Many who would normally be self-sufficient are looking for help this year.

"Oh well" we say, philosophically, "every Christmas brings something". In fact, the things I am talking about have nothing to do with Christmas really. It is just that the expectations that go with Christmas heighten the contrast between what we have and what we wish we had.

Christmas is not about having lots of material possessions either, is it? No, it is about something deeper, something immeasurably greater. It is about knowing that the one, only creator of all that exists, is not distant but has come near. God has come near, not in power and judgement but in innocence and vulnerability, in the most humble of circumstances.

The poet Christina Rosetti captures the spirit of Christmas and perhaps, this Christmas especially, with the tone and the message which match our present circumstances. The church has set her words to music in the carol, 'In the bleak mid-winter'.

Here, in Bermuda, this year we find ourselves in spirit if not in fact 'in the bleak mid-winter' of social and economic distress. And yet, the poet reminds us, 'a stable place sufficed, the Lord God almighty, Jesus Christ'. Common sense will ask what good this lovely story is in the face of guns and recession? Hardly enough, we think, to deal with the really serious problems of the world.

And yet, history has borne out that in that stable 2,000 years ago a candle of hope was lit that the centuries of wars and violence and economic downturns and depressions have failed to snuff out. In fact, the darker it gets, the brighter does that light shine.

In the words of the Gospel writer, St John, 'the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it'.

Carols will still be sung this year in the neighbourhoods darkened by violence and in the homes where there will be less this year than last. Worshippers will renew the gift of their hearts in worship and service. And the light of hope lit by God in the birth of Jesus will shine brighter in the darkness.