“Christmas comes again”—so begins one of my favourite songs of this festive season, perhaps the most convivial of times reserved for celebration, for gathering together in high-minded good will and good cheer. Yet, there are some who are perturbed by any locking of the “holiday” season onto Jesus or the religion that claims him. To that mind-set I am compelled to play apologist.
Whether one looks upon Jesus “called the Christ” as a religious reformer, a prophet, a divine being, or simply an ordinary man caught up in social histrionics and made into something more than he was, it must be acknowledged that this Jesus set in motion an ideal that has made the Western world we so value. If he is not the creator of our world, he is its inspiration.
This Galilean carpenter turned itinerant preacher looked upon his religion and decided it needed a new attitude–one that was neither divisive, negative, condemnatory, small-minded, nor small-thinking. He taught rules have a place in life, but we cannot treat each other as text-book problems; life is lived well not by the book, but from the heart. We cannot divide the world into “us” and “them”, into Chosen and gentile, master and slave. We are one family, all equals meant to support and care for one another. There is no room for dour morality. There is nothing that cannot be forgiven, except perhaps not being open to the spirit of creativity, that élan for novelty, that essential dynamic at the heart of both the making of and the entering into fore-giveness. There is no fault, no mistake that cannot be turned around. Before Her Majesty’s new prime minister for Canada set upon “better is always possible”, this man inspired it.
Recently I wrote concerning morality that writing things in stone is best left to tombstones. The story of Jesus’ tombstone being rolled away is an admonishment of my position, for it claims not even the end of a man is the end of his value, his meaning. Indeed, this man’s meaning is still unfolding. His vision of a family of humankind is still being worked out in internationally subscribed declarations of the rights of man, the rights of all, the rights of groups less and less marginalized, women, children, indigenous peoples, et al. Our humanitarian ideas and ideals spell out on a broader cloth a vision that begins with him. Likewise, as one family, we have one home whose beauty and richness we must share with honesty and honour, and that reality, despite its deep roots in his religion and in the valiant efforts of his early followers, is only now beginning to be enshrined in our hearts and our laws.
Yes, a religion enwrapped him from the very start and, in a world where it was rule under a Caesar or a “barbarian” warlord, that was perhaps a necessity, a vessel to keep safe an ideal too dangerous to make into a socio-political platform. Perhaps it is still a necessity, for no one ought to ignore the fact that even a wide-open society with inclusive ideals can swiftly succumb to some form of insular, xenophobic totalitarianism. If better is always possible, it is only because it is the path chosen and adamantly embraced.
Yes, the Greeks had an idea about democracy, a by the people-rule, but they understood by demos, by the people, a citizenry that was supported by slaves double their number. It was hardly the democratic ideal we are still striving to create, a rule founded on the equality of all.
The humanitarian, democratic, egalitarian ideals that define the thrust of the Western world begin with the teachings of a simple man from a simple place in a backwater of a grand empire. Their progress is ours. We are the light to shine or to hide, the leaven to add or withhold; we are the possibilities for better or worse. Better is not an absolute; it denotes an on-going process. The Laurier inspired Trudeau-ism about looking for better and seeing sunny skies has, however, in Jesus’ version a preamble that elevates it from the pragmatics of politics to the subliminality of spirituality. Jesus speaks of his mission not only as a time for the re-creation of man and world, but as a time rooted in jubilee, in a joyful pause, a moment for beholding the riches with which we are blessed and for them to be thankful. For Jesus everything begins from the groundwork of gratitude, from the most positive and accepting foundation of self, of other, of world. Before the sunny sky can be effectively seen in its potentialities, one needs to appreciate its being there. There is no going forward toward better without first being thankful that one can move forward, that there is a place to pause, to acknowledge, to cherish both path and possibility.
Seventeen centuries ago a bishop of Rome looking for a date on which to celebrate the birth of Jesus took up his old Roman calendar and picked the day after the longest night, the day the days begin to get sunnier, December 25th. It has become Jesus’ nominal birthday. We can keep it as a holiday to mark a change of season or the nearing of a new year, or we can embrace the meaning it was anciently given, and celebrate it as a jubilee, a time of refreshment, renewal and re-creation, for it marks the point where began our world, our precious Western world, our way of life, our ideals and hopes. Thus, here we pause amidst a plethora of winter traditions garnered from sundry peoples, amidst romantic renderings of fabled tales from Matthew and Luke denoting the destiny of this man to remember the man, the gifted and seemingly insignificant man, who inspired a swathe of history still spinning itself out. We pause to be thankful for that incident of our history, that inspiration, that animation. We pause to be thankful the better is always before us. Christmas comes again, the reason and the season to raise a glass of good cheer and to gift each other with open minds, hearts, hopes, and arms.
Jesus claimed he was the light of the world as long as he was in the world. He instructed also his followers “you are the light”. Thus, with the prophet Isaiah I bid you: “Arise and shine” and let Christmas come again!