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Good morning. There’s a popular Perry Como song often played at Christmas which begins ‘There’s no place like home for the holidays’. It’s a bit clichéd, but contains more than a grain of truth, as I can remember from my own boarding school and student days; and I’m certainly looking forward to our 2 boys coming home to be with us for the festivities. 

Christmas is a busy time for travelling – but I’m also aware of just how much travel patterns have changed over the years. I was reminded of this by the fact that it’s now 50 years since Dr Beeching stepped down from the Railways Board, after four years of restructuring the railway network with the loss of some 8000 miles of track and 2000 stations. Even today opinion is divided as to whether this was a painful but necessary pruning, or a savage cutting back from which our railway system is only just beginning to recover. 

It all means that over the next few days there will be huge numbers travelling on motorways as well as by rail, with many others heading for airports. And while it may make for some logistical headaches, it also serves to remind us that this is just where the Christmas story begins, with a young couple having to make a journey at a busy time to catch up on some family business. Of course, Mary and Joseph didn’t have the same choice of transport options, and for them a donkey would have to do. But as we wish our loved ones ‘travelling mercies’, it’s good also to remember that the Christmas journey is one which God has made with and for us. 

Let us pray: 

Loving God,

In the story of Mary and Joseph you share with us what it means to travel in hope and depend on the hospitality of others; in all our journeying this Christmas time, may we know that you travel with us.

For Christ’s sake, Amen.