Christmas Musings

Odds & ends and photos from Christmas in the Year of Our Lord, 2019:

Ever hear the one about Christmas being a basically pagan holiday that the Church appropriated to quiet wild pagan revelries? It is so common you’ll hear otherwise intelligent people repeat it. It’s bunk. First, the solstice is the 20th/21st, never the 25th of December. Saturnalia, a Roman feast, ended on the 23rd. The Roman emperor Aurelian did inaugurate a feast of Sol Invictus (“The Conquering Sun”) in 274 AD, but Christians were already celebrating Christmas by that time. The other celebrations are only coincidences in time.

But what about Christmas trees, didn’t the pagans bring freshly cut trees into their homes in the winter? True! However, the whole Christmas tree thing comes from 17th century Germany (some claim from Martin Luther) and was a very late Christian addition. Probably a borrow, that.

Saint Nicolas, Papal Noel, Santa Claus: didn’t the pagans have magical figures who sometimes delivered gifts (or tricks) to children. True again, but there was also a real Saint Nicolas back in the third century AD. And the jolly old elf Americans know comes from . . . the publication of the poem “A visit from Saint Nicolas” in the early 1800s. You know it by heart: “Twas the night before Christmas, . . .” and it gave us a fat jolly Santa, magical reindeer, and chimney deliveries. Again, hardly a case for Christmas derivative of pagan practices.

Some claim the Bible does not tell us much about the date of the birth of Jesus Christ. There are clues throughout the Gospels, from the census of Caesar Augustus, the reign of Herod, etc. Some theologians spent their entire lives trying to discern clues like “when would pious Jews travel?” “when were the shepherds keeping watch in their fields?” or “what celestial events align with the star the wise men followed?” It ends up with a variety of possible days and even years. Early Christians were unconcerned: so much else that Jesus did was critically important; when he was born, not so much.

I was happy to see several commentaries this year on the meaning of Christmas, decrying commercialism, pettiness, discrimination and other vices of the human condition. Still, these writers too missed the meaning of Christmas. “It is better to give than to receive” is a beautiful thought, but not the meaning of Christmas. So too “treat others as you would be treated” and “remember the less fortunate” and even “love one another.”

The meaning of Christmas is so simple, it can be stated in a single Word: Incarnation. That God became man and dwelt among us, a revolutionary notion unprecedented in human beliefs before or since. He didn’t appear as a man, didn’t possess a body, wasn’t a spirit masquerading as a man, but was like all of us in all things except sin . . . and still God. That voluntary movement, from eternal and on-high to lowly, ephemeral, mortal? That is love. And He did this for all.

Christmas portends much more. It unlocks the door, setting the stage for the possibility of redemption. Easter will (of course) show just how far Divine love will go–even unto death, death on a cross–and throw open the gate wide. For now, we may revel in the possibility, the hope.

When you hear the phrase “Merry Christmas,” remember it is salutary greeting: not a challenge, not a conversion, just a sharing of joy. If you feel that joy, respond in kind; if not, simply say thanks.

¡Feliz Navidad!