Today's poem is the well-known and well-loved BC:AD by the English poet U A Fanthorpe.

The image is a library photo of a sculpture at St Martin in the Fields church in London, depicting the new born Christ, umbilical cord still attached... the raw humanity of incarnation.

A little self-indulgent, since I love both the poem and the image, but it is the last day!

So here's the last prayer of the series...

God of 'Before Christ', before the 'Common Era', before time itself

God of 'Anno Domini' - the 'Year of the Lord'- within the Common Era, here with us now...

As this Advent season draws to its close,

As, once more, w near the mystical moment that transforms history,

Let us, with magi and shepherds, prophets and priests,

With people we know and those we will never meet,

Walk on through the darkness - however haphazard our path -

And discover ourselves in the Kingdom of Heaven.

Amen