When should you open the Christmas gifts? Christmas Eve? Christmas Day? Before Christmas Mass or after Christmas Mass?

Hi, this is Fr. Rocky with another Advent Inspiration.

Families have traditions, and Christmas traditions are among the most enduring. Growing up in my family, we opened the bonanza of Christmas gifts on Christmas morning, but only after we had gone to Mass and had Christmas breakfast, which was extraordinary with bacon and eggs, ham and strudel, grapefruit and coffee, and champagne and milk duds.

So, if you open the gifts after Mass, if you’re a kid, your prayers at Mass will be prayers of petition: please, please, please! But if you open your gifts before Mass, your prayers at Mass will be prayers of thanksgiving: thank you, thank you, thank you! It works both ways.

P.S. If you have missed a previous Advent Inspiration, you can find all of them here.