Absinthe & Cookies (a bit bitter, a bit sweet)

Inventing Christmas

I very much liked this article An excerpt:

.... Of course, both the anticipation and the celebration are essential to Christmas. Joseph and Mary were in Bethlehem because of a "decree that went out from Caesar Augustus." How remarkable in the Gospel of Luke is this "coincidence," this linking of the first Roman emperor with the birth of the Son of Man in a manger, in that particular place at the origins of the House of David. But few knew of this event when it happened. Though angels were singing on high, it was a whole before a couple of Roman historians even hinted at it. Christmas is not a feast of great events in this world. Rather it is a feast that reminds that great things take place in small towns, in out of the way places, things that need time to grow, to flourish.

Rush Limbaugh one day talked of a book called The War Against Christmas. No doubt there is such a war. Christmas seems to bring out in some a certain kind of venom that strikes us Christians as bordering on the diabolical. "Why is this most tender of feasts subject to such resentment?" we wonder to ourselves. In these days of an often-intolerant tolerance, we hesitate to speculate. We know of the words spoken of this Child born amongst us that many would rise and fall because of Him. A sword would pierce the heart of His mother. He could not be ignored, even if rejected, perhaps especially if rejected. Such things go against the mood of our age, yet are more true in our age than ever before.

In the Breviary for Christmas Eve, we find a sermon of the great Augustine. "Awake, mankind!" he tells us. "For your sake God has become man.... I tell you again: for your sake, God became man." Is this the clue we need? "You would have suffered eternal death, had he not been born in time. Never would you have been freed from sinful flesh, had he not taken on himself the likeness of sinful flesh." We do not like to be reminded of our sinfulness. We do not like to know what is wrong so that we are left free to do what we will.

On Christmas Eve, our redemption is at hand. But it does not work itself out as we might like, as we would have done it if we were in charge. The shadow of the Cross hovers over the Manger. But what happens is for "our sake." We are to be "awake," almost as if it is possible for us to miss the most momentous thing that has happened to our kind. We can, indeed, choose not to see. .

Posted by Ithildin at December 22, 2005 11:00 AM | PROCURE FINE OLD WORLD ABSINTHE