World celebrates Christmas today

VATICAN CITY : Christians across the world celebrate Christmas today. In his Christmas Eve homily Thursday, Pope Francis noted the simplicity of Jesus' birth .

The pope counter-weighted his joy with a lament for people's excesses and what he described as a "culture of indifference, which not infrequently turns ruthless." Francis said Jesus "calls us to act soberly, in other words, in a way that is simple, balanced, consistent, capable of seeing and doing what is essential."