The Fact of Christ's Birth Organizes the Universe Around a New Axis

...Christianity is not something  verbal, something that belongs to the sphere of words. Neither is it a doctrine or,...a message. It presents itself...as a fact...as something that happened, as much more than a verbal message that was written down and that would count as a doctrine, or even a system. Msgr. Giussani does not speak of Christianity but of what he calls the Christian fact. ... what we are dealing with in Christianity is not a doctrine, but a person who must be taken as such and for whom one must make space in one's life.  To convey this idea Giussani uses a splendid metaphor describing how the birth of a child forces the entire universe of a family to reorganize: "When a child is born into a family, it is clear to the parents, to the grandparents, to the whole family and to friends that this is a fact. There is nothing to dispute: a new bed is needed. Perhaps another bedroom; we have to give thought to how to take care of the new arrival; we are concerned about feeding, clothing, and protecting him or her; we get up at night if he or she needs us. The shape of daily life is transformed by virtue of this fact...Christianity is a fact in the very same way. It entered history just as a child enters the house of a husband and wife. Christianity is an irreducible event, an objective presence that desires to reach man; until the very end it means to be a provocation to him and to offer a judgment of him." 

 A Generative Thought, edited by Elisa Buzzi, Chapter Two: Christianity: a Fact in History,  p.35

Carron: Faith and Hope in Christ

                                         In His Name We Find Hope

 If the judgment called faith dominates life, you see it in the fact that this being seized is what comes forth in the way we face all the circumstances of life; it comes forth by default, as they say, as when one, no matter what experience she has, no matter what happens to her, is invaded by the memory of something she cares about, a presence she cares about. So then, you see that the relationship with this presence dominates because it reappears with evidence in every experience; I do not invent it when I need it. I do not create it when faced with the dramatic circumstances of living. It comes to mind, imposes itself on me, in front of all the circumstances, be they beautiful or ugly. At times they are more meaningful when they are beautiful because they are less at risk of "being invented"; when they are ugly, since there has to be some meaning, one can run the risk of inventing a meaning. When life is full, this risk lessens: that acknowledgement imposes itself and that memory arises, because I cannot watch the sunset, or an evening together, without the emergence of that urgent need, the strong pressure to say his name.

Fr. Julian Carron, Magnificat magazine,  July 2013, p. 284