Christmas 2008
Here I am,
At the end of a road
Again.
The lights
Of just another Bethlehem,
Ornaments
Like tiny stars --
A cold wind.
They tell me
Over and over,
There’s just no room at the Inn.
Not a single, solitary place
To be sheltered in…
I see a tear
On Mary’s cheek.
So tired,
The Baby
Just can’t sleep,
He cries out
From His altar –
When He came here
Looking
For a manger.
How could He know
What
We would do to Him?
A story
Is more than paper,
Like something
In a package
Under the tree.
We wonder
And shake it --
Hope what it
Will be.
Maybe a baby
A gift
To you and me.
Here I am,
At the end of a road
Again.
The lights
Of just another Bethlehem…
Star bright, Star light
What will I see tonight?
Friday, December 19, 2008
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Advent and Christmas
I believe that advent ("the waiting") is the time for our preparation for the experience of remembering and celebrating creation. To me, creation is the very essence of Christmas. The union of the reality of our human existence and that creative spirit in the nature of things; the offspring that is me, as I look in the mirror, and beyond me, as I look beyond the mirror, beyond my cognition, beyond even the powers of my cognition. As a Christian, I struggle to relate to what it must have been like to be Jesus, the thoughts... the feelings... the fears... the hopes... the love... so that I might better follow Him. Such a daunting enterprise... so, at this time of year I celebrate the simplest, most beautiful, most mysterious image of all our experiences... the baby.
The Baby is Jesus. The angels sing, the universe pays homage... and so do I.
I realize that the "real" time of Christmas can be, like other times, very different from the "meaning" of Christmas. So, "real" Christmases in the shopping malls, in the midst of our dysfunctional culture, government, economy, familes and personal lives are often all the more poignant and sad; hopes of peace, love, beauty, "the Baby" seem so far away and even silly. In his ministry, over and over Jesus spoke to all kinds of people seemingly caught in their lives, caught in "real" Christmases, and he said, "stop, look, listen... their is a kingdom of heaven at hand all around you." In that kingdom, that is right here and right now, there are angels singing, shepherd's tending their flocks, wise men coming from the East and there is "the Baby."
Jesus message is difficult to swallow, perhaps especially at Christmas. There is no natural (as in laws of nature), moral, theological, cultural or other imperative from God, Jesus or any other authority that imposes Christmas, in its essence, upon us. To be in the "kingdom of heaven" is a choice, and a difficult one at that. It is a choice beyond rational, beyond feelings that we feel comfortable with... ultimately a matter of faith; faith so strong that, as Jesus put it, we must be willing to or even really "die" in some sense to experience it.
The stories, like our lives, can be hard, unlike the story of the Baby in the manger at Bethlehem. And so, in advent, we must prepare ourselves to leave those stories behind. We must look deep within our spirits, look into the stars in the skies, look at what is beautiful and enduring in the midst of and in spite of everything. We must raise our eyes to the heavens and prepare to sing with the heavenly host. The power of God. The image of the Baby Jesus.
Creating Christmas: Discovering the Sacraments of the Nativity
I recently read an account of the Christmas story in Newsweek, an article analyzing the biblical accounts in historical perspective; questioning the proof for the related events.
It was a very respectable and thoughtful article for its purpose, “… we can see that the Nativity saga is neither fully fanciful nor fully factual but a layered narrative of early tradition and enduring theology… .”
The Christmas story told in Matthew and Luke is certainly retrospective and second-hand information. There is no contemporaneous narration. Nor do any of the accounts of Jesus teachings or actions specifically refer to or enlighten us about the actual events at his birth. One can surmise, like the author of the Newsweek article, that this status of our knowledge about the events of the Christmas story, in general, and the lack of any first hand account, more specifically, results from the fact the importance of the events was not and really could not have been recognized contemporaneously. It is certainly true that for the most part the participants in the recounted events were not of social, political or other status to expect that they would have provided written accounts, or that others around them would have deemed their lives and activities “newsworthy.”
My reaction is not quite so glib. In any event, to me, to analyze the Christmas story as literal history versus literary exposition misses the point. God could certainly have included an eyewitness account had He seen fit. Moreover, as I thought about it, the approach we have to take through the available information to understand or otherwise “process” Christmas seems to be, in and of itself, part of the story.
Recently, there was a group of infamous trial lawyers whose notoriety came from outlandish aggressiveness. Whenever a witness would attempt to offer evidence of his/her name, birthdate or other such identifying information, the lawyers would vigorously make objection – hearsay! What can a person know about such matters other than what they have been told?
So, as we mature into self-awareness, we create the first chapters of our life stories, the foundation of our identities, from the bits and pieces of historical and second-hand information that comes to us from family, photographs, and all kinds of sources. It is this kind of information that plays a seminal part in my creation of me.
The Christmas story is an account of creation. Genesis is cosmology – an account of God creating and participating in the universe. Christmas is genealogy -- an account of our spiritual lineage. I look at the Christmas story like looking into a baby book. There are the snapshots, the footprints, the swaddling cloth… -- as real as the wounded flesh that Thomas demanded for his belief. As unreal as life itself – in the manger or after the cross. God, here among us, here within me.
If I am to be a Christian, I must weave those images into myself and make them real in my own life. It is Jesus’ baby book; it is my own spiritual baby book. Creating Christmas in me is the manner in which grace, forgiveness, love, everlasting life – everything Jesus stood for – are born in me. These are God’s Christmas presents, to be unwrapped and used as I might strive for the potential that is both beyond and within me.
How do you create the innocence, beauty and audacity of birth – even your own birth? What do you know about the being you see in the baby book? Creating Christmas is not easy. It is a task we do not often have the stomach for, since we have become so different, so occupied by other things, so preoccupied by fears, doubts and maturity. Let us ponder the lessons, analyze the historical data, reach out for Jesus’ wounds… .
I think Scrooge finds out that creating Christmas is about the aesthetic, not the empirical experience of things. In our aesthetic sense, there are ghosts and there are angels, there are stars that give directions, there are kings from faraway kingdoms bearing gifts, there is a Holy Presence which is the fountain of all procreation… . To say “aesthetic” is not to deny the literal, but to recognize that the literal is not all of the story. God’s reality is the palette on which we are drawn in perspective with all creation, in all shades of color and light. We know that is true with every image on every Christmas card that we have ever carefully selected to send that special Christmas message.
The angels, the songs, the stable, the manger, the shepherds, the wise men … these are the sacraments of Christmas -- those special ornaments we unpack and admire every year in those special places -- those things from the baby book that tell us who Jesus was, who we are. They are sacraments of mysterious and real truth. It is the truth beyond understanding. The truth of Joy, Love, Peace and Goodness -- the truth of the Baby Jesus.
I believe that God’s promise, through Jesus, is that if we will believe in these things, if we will participate in these sacraments, then they will become a part of us – the enduring part of us, the perfect part of us that will be welcomed into God’s own family.
The Baby is Jesus. The angels sing, the universe pays homage... and so do I.
I realize that the "real" time of Christmas can be, like other times, very different from the "meaning" of Christmas. So, "real" Christmases in the shopping malls, in the midst of our dysfunctional culture, government, economy, familes and personal lives are often all the more poignant and sad; hopes of peace, love, beauty, "the Baby" seem so far away and even silly. In his ministry, over and over Jesus spoke to all kinds of people seemingly caught in their lives, caught in "real" Christmases, and he said, "stop, look, listen... their is a kingdom of heaven at hand all around you." In that kingdom, that is right here and right now, there are angels singing, shepherd's tending their flocks, wise men coming from the East and there is "the Baby."
Jesus message is difficult to swallow, perhaps especially at Christmas. There is no natural (as in laws of nature), moral, theological, cultural or other imperative from God, Jesus or any other authority that imposes Christmas, in its essence, upon us. To be in the "kingdom of heaven" is a choice, and a difficult one at that. It is a choice beyond rational, beyond feelings that we feel comfortable with... ultimately a matter of faith; faith so strong that, as Jesus put it, we must be willing to or even really "die" in some sense to experience it.
The stories, like our lives, can be hard, unlike the story of the Baby in the manger at Bethlehem. And so, in advent, we must prepare ourselves to leave those stories behind. We must look deep within our spirits, look into the stars in the skies, look at what is beautiful and enduring in the midst of and in spite of everything. We must raise our eyes to the heavens and prepare to sing with the heavenly host. The power of God. The image of the Baby Jesus.
Creating Christmas: Discovering the Sacraments of the Nativity
I recently read an account of the Christmas story in Newsweek, an article analyzing the biblical accounts in historical perspective; questioning the proof for the related events.
It was a very respectable and thoughtful article for its purpose, “… we can see that the Nativity saga is neither fully fanciful nor fully factual but a layered narrative of early tradition and enduring theology… .”
The Christmas story told in Matthew and Luke is certainly retrospective and second-hand information. There is no contemporaneous narration. Nor do any of the accounts of Jesus teachings or actions specifically refer to or enlighten us about the actual events at his birth. One can surmise, like the author of the Newsweek article, that this status of our knowledge about the events of the Christmas story, in general, and the lack of any first hand account, more specifically, results from the fact the importance of the events was not and really could not have been recognized contemporaneously. It is certainly true that for the most part the participants in the recounted events were not of social, political or other status to expect that they would have provided written accounts, or that others around them would have deemed their lives and activities “newsworthy.”
My reaction is not quite so glib. In any event, to me, to analyze the Christmas story as literal history versus literary exposition misses the point. God could certainly have included an eyewitness account had He seen fit. Moreover, as I thought about it, the approach we have to take through the available information to understand or otherwise “process” Christmas seems to be, in and of itself, part of the story.
Recently, there was a group of infamous trial lawyers whose notoriety came from outlandish aggressiveness. Whenever a witness would attempt to offer evidence of his/her name, birthdate or other such identifying information, the lawyers would vigorously make objection – hearsay! What can a person know about such matters other than what they have been told?
So, as we mature into self-awareness, we create the first chapters of our life stories, the foundation of our identities, from the bits and pieces of historical and second-hand information that comes to us from family, photographs, and all kinds of sources. It is this kind of information that plays a seminal part in my creation of me.
The Christmas story is an account of creation. Genesis is cosmology – an account of God creating and participating in the universe. Christmas is genealogy -- an account of our spiritual lineage. I look at the Christmas story like looking into a baby book. There are the snapshots, the footprints, the swaddling cloth… -- as real as the wounded flesh that Thomas demanded for his belief. As unreal as life itself – in the manger or after the cross. God, here among us, here within me.
If I am to be a Christian, I must weave those images into myself and make them real in my own life. It is Jesus’ baby book; it is my own spiritual baby book. Creating Christmas in me is the manner in which grace, forgiveness, love, everlasting life – everything Jesus stood for – are born in me. These are God’s Christmas presents, to be unwrapped and used as I might strive for the potential that is both beyond and within me.
How do you create the innocence, beauty and audacity of birth – even your own birth? What do you know about the being you see in the baby book? Creating Christmas is not easy. It is a task we do not often have the stomach for, since we have become so different, so occupied by other things, so preoccupied by fears, doubts and maturity. Let us ponder the lessons, analyze the historical data, reach out for Jesus’ wounds… .
I think Scrooge finds out that creating Christmas is about the aesthetic, not the empirical experience of things. In our aesthetic sense, there are ghosts and there are angels, there are stars that give directions, there are kings from faraway kingdoms bearing gifts, there is a Holy Presence which is the fountain of all procreation… . To say “aesthetic” is not to deny the literal, but to recognize that the literal is not all of the story. God’s reality is the palette on which we are drawn in perspective with all creation, in all shades of color and light. We know that is true with every image on every Christmas card that we have ever carefully selected to send that special Christmas message.
The angels, the songs, the stable, the manger, the shepherds, the wise men … these are the sacraments of Christmas -- those special ornaments we unpack and admire every year in those special places -- those things from the baby book that tell us who Jesus was, who we are. They are sacraments of mysterious and real truth. It is the truth beyond understanding. The truth of Joy, Love, Peace and Goodness -- the truth of the Baby Jesus.
I believe that God’s promise, through Jesus, is that if we will believe in these things, if we will participate in these sacraments, then they will become a part of us – the enduring part of us, the perfect part of us that will be welcomed into God’s own family.
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