“If I could just go off to an island for the next month,” someone said to me, “and come back for the holiday itself, that would be so much more preferable than all this.”
“The holiday” did not necessarily imply Christmas day exclusively, but the combined spiritual festivity that does, more or less congeal for many people in this currently stressed-out, irritable, road-enraged, discourteous, credit-pressured, and uncivil nation on December 25. The madness that officially began with nocturnal fistfights on the so-called Black Friday (the “Black” reference being completely mercantile), pauses (please God) with family and devotionals and candle-lightings at one or the other solstice festivals in December, but then falls into the abyss of the late December and January Debt Realization Shock and Awe.
Why does December have to be the month when we lose our souls?
Neither Judah the Maccabee nor Jesus of Nazareth died for any of this.
The former, of Hanukkah fame, gave his life circa 165 BCE in the name of religious freedom—a touchstone of American liberties and values. Hanukkah is about that, a minor festival in and by itself, swollen by the commercial infatuation of December, that has catapulted the remembrance on the part of Christians of the birth of the Savior into what is now a 45-day traffic jam and emotional - profitable cacophony.
I really don’t like what is happening out there, on our streets, in our malls, even in the “comments” sections of our newspapers and web publications. The utter meanness, the cold-heartedness, the need to minimize, polarize, crush, destroy, all seem to be hardening rather than softening in the light of the holidays. Granted, our economy is floundering, and a clergyman needs to avoid the clouds lest he lose sight of the fact that a) people need to earn a living and business needs to get moving, and b) there has been and continues be egregious fiscal injustice in this land. In other words, December is a big month for the economy.
I get that, but why does December have to be the month when we lose our souls?
Image: ShutterStock
Comments
Amen.
At the macro level there's much to mock this time of year. But if you look at each holiday transaction in isolation there's less to criticize. Which mother shouldn't go to which mall? Buy which iPod for her daughter? Enjoy which latte? The musician depends on that iPod sale. The retail clerk does, too, as does the factory worker in China. It all adds up to someone's definition of excess, the definition of judgmental, the last thing Jesus would preach. Where does Judaism come down on 'judge not'?
Lest we forget, this also happens to be the loneliest time of the year for many -- those with failed expectations --of family and circumstances. Let each of us commit to sharing with those in need -- whether it be our bounty or our hearts.
The idea that the rest of the world defines my celebration of the holidays is revolting. If one's intentions are kind, and one's expression sincere I don't much care what the rest of the world does.
Every year the pastor tells us to give gifts of kidnness and charity and every year the church has more ornaments in it.
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