For many of us, I suspect, it gets harder each year to capture the mood of Christmas. About the only thing that still warms us are memories: memories of younger, more naïve days when lights and carols, Christmas trees and gifts still excited us. But we are adult now and so too, it seems, is our world. Any joy of anticipation of Christmas is blunted by many things, not least by the commercialism that, like almost everything else in life, is characterised by excess. By late October we are affronted by Christmas decorations, Santa Claus is around for all of November and most of December, and we are force-fed a series of Christmas parties which exhaust us long before December 25.
So how can we crank up any real joy and genuine celebration? It’s not easy, and excessive commercialism is only a minor obstacle. More serious are the times we live in. Can we, amid all the many cruelties of this year, warm up to a season of tinsel and festivity?
Can we continue to romanticise the pilgrimage of two people 2,000 years ago amid the flight of the millions of refugees who are journeying with no place to go? Does it mean anything to speak of peace after various elections this year polarised our nations and left millions unable to speak civilly to their neighbours? Are there any silent nights left?
Moreover, there are our own personal tragedies: the death of loved ones, lost marriages, lost families, lost health, lost jobs, lost time, tiredness and frustration. How do we celebrate the birth of a redeemer in a world which looks shockingly unredeemed and with hearts that mostly feel heavy and unredeemed?
The Christmas story is not easily made credible. Who can still believe that God came down from heaven, took on human flesh, ultimately conquered all suffering and altered the entire course of human history?
This isn’t easy to believe amid all the evidence that seems to contradict it, but its credibility is contingent upon it being properly understood. The redemptive power of Christmas is not a magical event, a Cinderella story without midnight. Indeed, its centre speaks of humiliation, of pain and of forced fleeing which is not unlike that being experienced by all the victims of injustice on our planet. It mirrors too the pain that is experienced within our own wounded and tired hearts.
Incarnation is not yet the Resurrection. Flesh in Jesus, as in us, is human flesh, vulnerable, weak, incomplete, needy, painfully full of limit, suffering. Christmas celebrates Christ’s birth into these things, not his removal of them. Christ redeems limit, evil, sin and pain. They are not abolished. For this reason we can celebrate Christ’s birth without in any way denying or trivialising the real evil in our world and the very real pain in our lives. Christmas is a challenge to celebrate while still in pain.
The incarnate God is called Emmanuel, a name which means “God is with us”. That fact does not mean immediate festive joy. Our world remains unwhole and wars, strikes, selfishness and bitterness linger. Our hearts too remain unwhole and pain lingers. For a Christian, just as for everyone else, there will be incompleteness, illness, senseless hurt, broken dreams, cold, hungry lonely days of bitterness and a lifetime of inconsummation.
Reality has its harshness and Christmas does not ask us to make-believe. The Incarnation does not promise us heaven on earth. It promises heaven in heaven. Here on earth, it promises us something else – God’s presence in our lives. This presence redeems because the sense that God is with us is what ultimately empowers us to give up bitterness, forgive and move beyond cynicism and bitterness. When God is with us, then pain and happiness are not mutually exclusive and the agonies and riddles of life do not exclude deep meaning and deep joy.
As Avery Dulles puts it: “The Incarnation does not provide us with a ladder by which to escape from the ambiguities of life and scale the heights of heaven. Rather, it enables us to burrow deep into the heart of planet earth and find it shimmering with divinity.”
George Orwell prophesied that our world would eventually be full of tyranny, torture, doublethink and a broken human spirit. To some extent this is true. We are a long way from being whole. We remain deeply in exile. However, we need to celebrate Christmas 2016 heartily. Maybe we won’t feel the same thrill we once felt as a child, when we were excited about tinsel, lights, Christmas carols, special gifts and food. Some of that excitement can’t be found, by us, any more. But something else can still be found, namely, the sense that God is with us in our lives, in our joys as well as in our shortcomings.
The Word became flesh. That’s an incredible thing, something which must be celebrated with tinsel, lights and songs of joy. Anyone who really understands Christmas will want to be involved in an exchange of gifts.
Areas of Catholic Herald business are still recovering post-pandemic.
However, we are reaching out to the Catholic community and readership, that has been so loyal to the Catholic Herald. Please join us on our 135 year mission by supporting us.
We are raising £250,000 to safeguard the Herald as a world-leading voice in Catholic journalism and teaching.
We have been a bold and influential voice in the church since 1888, standing up for traditional Catholic culture and values. Please consider donating.