Christmas

I imagine most of us know the experience of finding that the anticipation of a something can be better than the reality. If it is a vacation, you long for the sun, the warmth, the relaxation  and when the reality comes it just doesn't live up to all the dreams. Maybe it can't.  I think something like this happens at Christmas.

Perhaps more than most holidays Christmas has dreams attached.  Family. A tree with lovely lights and baubles. Presents. Peace. Snow. All these things have emotions attached to them and a lot of our imagination and anticipation is invested in these emotions. But the day comes and perhaps there is disappointment: we squabble with the family, the weather is dreadful, we don't like our presents or someone we love doesn't seem to like what we gave them. I have wondered what these probably unreal expectations say about our understanding of Christmas.


It seems that for so many people Christmas has become a secular holiday. This probably means that  the great majority of people no longer know the origins of the feast in the birth of Jesus. Perhaps then, that also means that people aren't quite sure just what Christmas is 'for'. It is true that there is much that gives many people joy at Christmas - it is a time for family and for celebrating friendships around a shared meal, for giving and receiving gifts. It is sadly, also a time when the lonely feel more alone, when the homeless suffer more from the loss of their roots, when the elderly long for a visit from their family and often may not get it, when the poor can't share in the abundant gifts on offer in the stores. Has it just become an opportunity to have a rather light-hearted family festival in the middle of winter?


The older I get the more simple Christmas becomes for me. Of course, I love giving and getting gifts and being with family but if all that were taken away Christmas would still be, for me, a wonderful time of gratitude and joy. The gratitude is for the most elegant and transforming gift of all: the gift of God's love for us in Jesus, the human face of God. And the joy is just joy for such a gift. Oddly, this is not dependent upon lots of presents or their value or on whether life is going smoothly or is suffering. It is simply and purely the only gift that in the end, gives my life any meaning.


Right now some of my family are celebrating Hannukuh. It too is a feast in recognition of God's goodness and love and it is a feast filled with light and family and thanksgiving. I think we all need something like that to keep us from simply living on the surface.


So, to all who may read this I wish you a blessed holiday, a Christmas filled with love that lasts, a Hannukuh filled with life. I will be back in a couple of weeks.