December 24, 2015
Christmas Eve
Luke 2:1-7
Titus 3:4-7
(prayer)
We have to endure it every
year.
//
Around the time that
Halloween passes and we move into November, our society starts to promote the
economic potential of the Christmas season.
//
I am sure many of you are
like me and you mutter under your breath (at some point) saying: I can't
believe that 'they' have Christmas stuff out already!
But, even as we annually
complain about the commercialization of Christmas, there are some who get their
longjohns in a knot when some companies don't market Christmas enough in the
way they expect.
//
Remember this
pseudo-controversy?
Oh, the horror.
//
The precise examples change
each year, but equally as inevitable as seeing coloured lights for sale on
November 3rd, in the weeks leading up to December 25th, there will be news
stories and social media memes proclaiming that we are experiencing a War On Christmas.
I had some fun on my
Facebook page a few weeks ago posting a picture of my morning Tim Horton's cup
pointing out that (unlike Starbucks) it had 'snowflakes and reindeer - just
like in the bible'.
//
Donald Trump said a week
ago yesterday: "If I become president, we are going to be saying Merry Christmas at every store... You
can leave Happy Holidays at the
corner."
//
Every year, we have to
endure the hawkish Christian soldiers onwardly fanning the flames on the War on
Christmas.
//
Personally, I have always
been a bit puzzled as to why Happy
Holidays is so bemoaned as a un-Christmas-y phrase.
Holidays is a shorthand way
of saying "Holy Days". It is a
word with obvious and explicit religious meaning.
Even Seasons Greetings (which has no etymological connection to
religion) can be heard as an affirmation of Christmas when we remember that,
(traditionally) Christmas is a twelve day 'season' going from December 25th to
January 5th. In the church, certainly,
we call the period starting on the fourth Sunday before Christmas as the Season
of Advent - and that period from Christmas to Epiphany as the Season of
Christmas: followed by the Season after Epiphany, the Season of Lent , the
Season of Easter and the Season after Pentecost.
If you go to a church that
marks the seasons of the church year,
you may even notice that (often) specific colours identify the different
seasons.
So, to church-folk, it
should always be appropriate to say Seasons
Greetings.
And yet every year,
hundreds of modern day wannabe prophets pen new blogs lamenting the absence of
an explicit "Merry Christmas" greeting from the guy in the
drive-thru.
//
//
Let me add my two cents to
the conversation:
THERE
IS NO
WAR
ON CHRISTMAS
//
I don't just say that
because I detest the misuse of the violent battlefield language (that rolls of
some people's tongues far too easily) to describe literally hundreds of efforts
to comment on aspects of our society.
I detest the "war
on..." language because it serves to dilute, distract and desensitize us
from what are truly 'wars' being experienced in our world.
My main disappointment is
that people (even so-called people of
faith) seem to be botheted less by real war than red coffee cups in
December.
There is no war on
Christmas. It is a made-up conflict
espoused by those who are not interested in taking ownership of their own beliefs
and religious observances in a 21st century world where (moreso than at any
other time in history) we aware of the diversity of the human experience.
//
It's not that the world's
diversity and variety has significantly changed, but with the ability for
people to travel and understand the globe (through physical movement and
through learning from increasing accessible media and shared knowledge), we
have become more aware of the diversity that has always existed.
//
It is only those who can't
admit that they were living in an isolating bubble who feel like their world
has changed.
//
The 'war on christmas'
language is nothing more than a realization that - as we have matured and
progressed as a species - we cannot rely on the officialdom of our society to
maintain a false bubble of isolation.
//
When I was in theological
college a quarter century ago, I remember reading about the death of christendom. Even through the middle of the 20th century,
in North America, our (officially secular) governments protected and sanctioned
the practices of Christianity as societal norms. This was in spite of the fact that the
internationally recognized bordered nations of North America have never been
100% Christian.
As we moved through the
latter half of the last century, our societies have be coming to terms with the
false (and ironic) nature of the assumption that societies that proclaim a
freedom of religion should be expected to promote one particular religious
expression.
//
Here is my message for this
Christmas Eve: if we truly - and honestly - care about the place of Christian
faith in our lives; if we authentically desire to celebrate the birth of Jesus,
we should declare the War on Christmas, over.
//
Let us surrender the idea
that our story is the responsibility
of anyone else to share.
I am prepared to risk
insulting some people by saying that I think it is a 'lazy faith' that would
expect a government or store or public school or non-religious person to
promote your spiritual story.
//
It is Christmas, Christians...
take it upon yourselves to celebrate the story of a time when...
·
Augustus
was Caesar of the Roman Empire,
·
when
Quirinious was Governor of Syria,
·
when
Herod the Great was the King of Judea,
·
when
a pregnant teen gave birth to a baby in ancient King David's hometown called
"The House of Bread",
·
when
the first earthly breaths were drawn by one who would grow to inspire dozens to
join him on the road, sharing in his vision of God's compassion and justice.
//
This baby, whose name -
Jesus - literally means the 'Salvation of God' (Yehoshua: Yahweh Saves)
famously encouraged his followers to proclaim the good news they had come to
believe - but, if there were those who did not share in their enthusiasm, to
clean off their shoes and move on to another place and proclaim the good news
there (cf. Mark 6:11). Jesus knew that
was good news to his followers would not appeal to everyone, but the focus was
not to be on the rejection or apathy of some, but on the message that was the
disciples to share. 'Shaking the dust
off of one's saddles' was an old pious hebrew practice to declare that one was
removing the negative residue from a place of rejection.
To allow ourselves to be
mired in a War on Christmas only serves to take our focus off the goodness of
God's compassion and justice that was embodied in Jesus.
As people of this story,
our goodnews includes that proclamation from the letter of Titus: we are
inheriters of the gift of God's hope through the richness of our spirituality
founded in Jesus.
That's our story.
The absence of a Christmas
tree in the public square nor a corporate Merry
Christmas along with our economic consumption does not take our story from
us.
Feel free to Go Tell it on The Mountain. Share your gifts in the world. Pause in grateful prayer by the manger.
It is the story of the
goodness and loving-kindness of God.
It is "your"
story if you want it.
//
Let us pray:
Teach us to sing your praise, O God as
the angels of old. Your glory shines in
our world and we are changed. Amen.
#38VU
“Angels We Have Heard on High”
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