This festival is celebrated by the Church in order to commemorate the
obedience of our Lord in fulfilling all righteousness, which is one
branch of the meritorious cause of our redemption, and by that means
abrogating the severe injunctions of the Mosaic law, and placing us
under the grace of the Gospel.
God gave to Abraham the command to circumcise all male children on the
eighth day after birth, and this rite was to be the seal of covenant
with Him, a token that, through shedding of the blood of One to come,
remission of the original sin inherited from Adam could alone be
obtained. It was also to point out that the Jews were cut off, and
separate, from the other nations. By circumcision, a Jew belonged to the
covenant, was consecrated to the service of God, and undertook to
believe the truths revealed by Him to His elect people, and to hold the
commandments to which He required obedience. Thus, this outward sign
admitted him to true worship of God, true knowledge of God, and true
obedience to God's moral law. Circumcision looked forward to Christ,
who, by His blood, remits sin. Consequently, as a rite pointing to Him
who was to come, it is abolished, and its place is taken by baptism,
which also is a sign of covenant with God, admitting to true worship,
true knowledge, and true obedience. But baptism is more than a covenant,
and therefore more than was circumcision. It is a Sacrament; that is, a
channel of grace. By baptism, supernatural power, or grace, is given to
the child, whereby it obtains that which by nature it could not have.
Circumcision admitted to covenant, but conferred no grace. Baptism
admits to covenant, and confers grace. By circumcision, a child was made
a member of God's own peculiar people. By baptism, the same is done; but
God's own people is now not one nation, but the whole Catholic Church.
Christ underwent circumcision, not because He had inherited the sin of
Adam, but because He came to fulfil all righteousness, to accomplish the
law, and for the letter to give the spirit.
It was, probably, the extravagances committed among the heathen at the
kalends of January, upon which this day fell, that hindered the Church
for some ages from proposing it as an universal set festival. The
writings of the Fathers are full of invectives against the idolatrous
profanations of this day, which concluded the riotous feasts in honour
of Saturn, and was dedicated to Janus and Strena, or Strenua, a goddess
supposed to preside over those presents which were sent to, and received
from, one another on the first day of the year, and which were called
after her, strenae; a name which is still preserved in the _étrennes_, or
gifts, which it is customary in France to make on New Year's Day.
But, when the danger of the heathen abuses was removed, by the
establishment of Christianity in the Roman empire, this festival began
to be observed; and the mystery of our Blessed Lord's Circumcision is
explained in several ancient homilies of the fifth century. It was,
however, spoken of in earlier times as the Octave of the Nativity, and
the earliest mention of it as the Circumcision is towards the end of the
eleventh century, shortly before the time of S. Bernard, who also has a
sermon upon it. In the Ambrosian Missal, used at Milan, the services of
the day contain special cautions against idolatry. In a Gallican
Lectionary, which is supposed to be as old as the seventh century, are
special lessons "In Circumcisione Domini." Ivo, of Chartres, in 1090,
speaks of the observance of this day in the French Church. The Greek
Church also has a special commemoration of the Circumcision.