Yes, it's the time of the year again!
Thousands of revellers celebrated Christmas across the nation with most churches holding the traditional midnight mass.
Security has been heightened at churches across India on Christmas Eve, taking into consideration a series of untoward incidents at Christian institutes around the same time last year.
Kolkata was all decked up with lights, balloons, Christmas trees and other decorations to welcome the occasion and witnessed a huge number of people taking to the streets to soak in the revelry.
Starting from Park Street, Allen Park, Bow Barracks, St Paul's Cathedral and other famous churches in and around the city to other major landmarks, revellers poured out in thousands with the evening slipping into midnight.
Kolkata Police have tightened the security measures in the city and till midnight had arrested 50 persons for disorderly conduct, a senior officer of the force told PTI.
Around 500 police personnel were deployed in the Park Street area only, the nerve-centre of Christmas revelry with officers of Deputy Commissioner rank overseeing the situation.
Meanwhile, the St Sebastian Catholic Church in Delhi’s Dilshad Garden, our Lady of Grace Church in west Delhi's Vikaspuri and St Alphonsa's Church in Vasant Kunj, which had all witnessed incidents ranging from arson to burglary between last December and March this year, are among the top secured churches in the city, said a senior police official.
"All necessary arrangements have been made in and around churches and Christian institutes at other places in the city wherever gatherings are expected before and on Christmas day," said Delhi Police spokesperson Rajan Bhagat.
The churches have been put under round-the-clock security from the past few days, with personnel provided by the police stations under whose jurisdiction they come.
The security personnel are briefed by the concerned station house officers everyday and senior officials review the arrangements on a regular basis, an official said.
Voicing concern over the "increasing dose of intolerance" holding sway over the lives of people, Archbishop of Goa Filipe Neri Ferrao on Thursday called for better understanding, reconciliation and peace as enshrined in the message of Christmas.
"Sadly we find an increasing dose of intolerance holding sway in our lives. Not only people of different creeds and cultures, but people of the same family drift away from each other because of this intolerance and unforgivingness," Ferrao said in his Christmas message released today.
Citing the 'Year of Mercy' declared by Pope Francis, he called for prayers for "more understanding, more mercy, more reconciliation and peace."
Spiritual leader of over three lakh Catholics in the coastal state, Ferrao said, "We are in the year of the family and very recently our Pope Francis inaugurated the year of mercy."
"Let us pray for all families as well as for various social and religious communities. Let there be more understanding, more mercy more reconciliation and peace," he said.
"If the Holy Babe lies helpless in the crib, we feel encouraged to approach him with the situations of unrest in the world, in our country and in our state... We pray that the Babe of Bethlehem, the Prophet of Peace, may encourage us all to promote dialogue and reconciliation and to sustain our efforts to build peace," the Archbishop added.
"On this happy occasion of Christmas, we cannot but echo this hymn of joy, the joy of the birth of Jesus, the Son of God-made man. Sharing in the joy of the Christian community, on their behalf and in my name, I extend greetings of peace and truth, mercy and kindness to all people of goodwill in this state," Ferrao stated in a release issued on the Christmas eve.
"In this Year of the Jubilee of the Mercy of God, we pray especially that the Prince of Peace may encourage us to be ever more efficient instruments of forgiveness and understanding, in the present and in the future," the archbishop stated.
With inputs from PTI.
