From time to time these myths are projected into reality to be acted out in all their detail, complications and connotations, as real events within the context of recorded human history. They become facts. This is the way we regard this celebration of the Nativity of Christ. We have come to understand all the familiar trappings of the story, as presented in the New Testament accounts, as being primarily symbols and glyphs, which are capable of communicating the truth about ourselves, our innermost spiritual state, the state of humanity and the cosmos. They are representative of the true facts of human nature and cosmic order.

They may speak to us differently and their appeal may vary according to our awareness of them and our willingness to accept them as being true for us. But symbols are not theological, they are not dogmatic, they don't force themselves upon us. They are gentle and wise, understanding of human nature. They will speak in their own way and in their own time, but speak they will, and they are speaking to us now. That is part, at least, of the compelling magic of Christmas; for our intuition has come alive, alert to what is being communicated, even if at the conscious level we may be more concerned with other things.

The great fact of Christmas, however - the eternal fact to which this great celebration recalls us - is the coming to birth within the world of time and space, the world of facts, of the Life and Consciousness of God.

God is incarnate in the world. About two thousand years ago, in a grubby outhouse, hewn from the rock in a backyard of a middle-Eastern hostelry, Jesus was born. With this birth of a child in whom the fullness of the divine life and consciousness was to be revealed, God recalled forgetful humanity to be mindful of its true estate. And now ­ as at every Christmas - we are reminded that the Divine is alive and well in the world, and especially in us.

It is a mind-boggling concept, we have to admit it, that the divine life and consciousness, which were incarnated in Jesus, are also already incarnate somewhere deep in our own natures! It is there now, in rudimentary seed form, in you and me! When the truth of this dawns, when the fantasy is finally revealed as fact, then our celebration of Christmas will be a real celebration. The details of the Gospel story, in all their rich symbolism, will be revealed for what they really are - the symbolic facts about ourselves.

The guiding star, the rock-hewn cave, the warm, comforting presence of the animals, the slumbering babe, the adoring man and woman, the worshipping shepherds and, later, the coming of the wise men from the East - all these will speak to us and release their hidden wisdom to us. They will prove to be the true facts of Christmas.

It is, however, the central fact of God's great act of creative love, one which we must first acknowledge, that He hasn't just created the world to let it get on with its own devices, to fend for itself: He has immersed Himself in it. So much so, that when humanity suffers, He suffers, and when the world groans in travail He experiences, more than ever, the confinement and imprisonment of His incarnation. However, He also experiences the hopes and joys of humanity, and celebrates in and through us. For we are the focus of His incarnational life. He has no body on earth but ours, no consciousness but ours, no hope but our own hope. In us lies the fulfilment of His dreams that all creation will, some day, be His again, in its completeness.

Christmas, therefore, recalls us to our duty, to be Christians in the truest sense of the word, that is, to live the Christ-Life to the full. It recalls us to the acknowledgement of our divine birthright and to act on that realisation.

Then the myth and the fantasy of Christmas will truly have become FACT.