Earlier this week, I reached out to local clergy and invited them to share their thoughts during this winter holiday season.
It was very short notice, and this is a busy time of year! But I did hear from some of them.
Without further ado, here are some wise words for this special time of year from some of our religious leaders. Please read on.
from Rabbi Fred Benjamin of Temple Shalom
A Jewish Response to “Merry Christmas”
“Tis the season to be jolly, fa la la la la la la la la,” but regardless of the time of year, the great Rabbi Shammai taught, “Greet every person with a cheerful face.” Is there really any worry that the intent of the “Merry Christmas” well wisher is suspect? It is not as if you were hit with, “May the birth of Christ our Savior bring you, your family and all humanity eternal salvation!” That might merit a longer conversation.
And so, ala Shammai, when the person behind the counter or an acquaintance offers Merry Christmas wishes without first ascertaining your theological pedigree, may I suggest that the “menschy” thing to do is to smile back and say, “And Happy Holidays to you too.” This response has the added benefit of putting into practice one of the Torah’s greatest attributes – “its ways are ways of pleasantness and all its paths are peace.”
And since this year Christmas Eve is also a Friday night, feel free to add in a quick “Happy Challah Day” or “Shabbat Shalom.”
from Reverend Sara Marean, Co-Pastor of East Congregational Church
For us as Christians, the Christmas holiday is a celebration of the fact that God came to be with us in the form of a tiny baby, born in a humble stable. We celebrate the miracle of Emmanuel, of God-with-us, with each one of us, in our sorrow, in our grief, in our laughter, in our joy. God has come to be with us in all the different ways that we are human, and we celebrate that. And we celebrate how this God changes us, how a little baby can bring out the childlike spirit in each one of us. Because this childlike spirit is also in our God.
This December, I have heard lots of people say, has been a very tough month for many of us. It has been busy, and hectic, and filled to the brim, sometimes with really difficult feelings, and situations, and experiences. At a time that is supposed to be joy-filled, and happy and light-hearted, these tough feelings can bring us down, can make us forget to hold onto the holiday spirit, can cause us to lose our sense of compassion and love for one another and for ourselves. So, this Christmas Day I invite my congregation, and all of us, as we gather with our family and friends, to take a moment out of the rush to remember the essence of the holiday spirit. Perhaps after you have opened your presents, or before you eat your dinner, pause together to celebrate in a different way.
Gather around the tree, or in front of the fire, hold hands, enjoy a few seconds of quiet, and invite that spirit of love, that spirit of God, into your hearts and lives. Then take some time to share how each one of you feels blessed, remember the places of joy in your lives, relate an experience or a story that describes the love in our world.
When we do this kind of remembering, when we share the playful holiday spirit, just like Santa’s sleigh, we too can learn to fly. There really is something magical that can happen at the holiday time if we just let it. It is a time when we may suspend our disbelief, when we are allowed to whole-heartedly eat and drink and laugh, and sled and make beautiful paper snowflakes. We need to believe, believe in Santa, believe in joy, for us Christians believe that God came to us as a little child, a poor child, wrapped in pieces of cloth in a manger. We need to believe that God is present in every child, in
every person. We need to open our hearts to that possibility. May we do just that this holiday season.
from Reverend Parisa Parsa, First Parish in Milton, Unitarian Universalist
We hear a lot of talk about peace at holiday time,
peace on the earth and good will toward all,
the birth of one who is known as the Prince of Peace.
We who don’t want to offend anyone’s religious or holiday sensibilities send out cards that
simply offer greetings of peace.
Those of us who live with some level of comfort in the world have a very clear idea of what we
mean by this peace:
a comfortable chair in a warm home;
gentle company of friends and family in just the right amount;
kids playing quietly while we sip some cocoa or tea.
For us peace usually means calm, and comfort, and freedom from worry.
Global peace, of course, is something that we wish for but find elusive, mysterious.
What would it be like to have a world where there was no war?
We wish for resolution to the conflicts we know of, but there’s a faraway quality to it.
The ins and outs of what it would take to get to peace are overwhelming to think about.
Peace? Yes, we want peace. What it will take, we cannot comprehend.
Most of us struggle enough to get to that personal sense of peace.
Just when we think the decks are cleared so we can settle down and enjoy a quiet moment to
meditate, to even think,
the phone rings,
or the child calls out,
or there is overtime to be worked,
or a family member gets sick.
We try to carve out the time for the spirit in the season that promises peace and find that our lives
prove a scientific principle: nature abhors a vacuum.
As soon as the space looks like it may open up, something rushes in to fill it.
And so we sing along to carols to salve our anxiety, to soothe our grief, to calm our fears
and we just keep moving on.
If we come to this season seeking peace, peace of the kind that means calm and stillness,
freedom from worry, we are rarely satisfied.
A member of the congregation recently told me that her three year old daughter came running
into the room to breathlessly announce to her parents that her favorite Christmas song was on
the radio. “Come quick!” she said, and invited them into the room where it was playing. As they
entered the room they could hear the strains of song and their daughter began to sing right along
with it: “Violent night, holy night”
I think that three year-old knew a thing or two.
The peace we sing about isn’t entirely silent, for sure. And sometimes we have fought hard for
it.
As much as this season brings the tempting allure of peace on earth,
and we bring a yearning for peace in our hearts,
the story of the nativity is not a story of peace.
We’ve certainly tried to contain it and make it seem peaceful:
Cute barnyard animals huddle in a stable around a swaddled baby bathed in warm light.
A teenage mother and her new husband father gaze adoringly while angels tell shepherds
and wise men make their way guided by a star.
But the story in its time was one of discomfort, upset and anxiety.
Our world history books tell us that during this time period there was an unusual period of peace
in the Roman Empire.
It has come to be known as the pax romana, the Roman Peace.
It was a 200 year period which was quite comfortable to those in power:
money was not being spent on costly wars of expansion;
the minority groups of the empire were effectively subjugated;
there was no real worry of upset to anyone’s way of living.
The ship of empire was well in hand and charting a steady course.
The Roman Empire had built this so-called peace by conquering many lands,
and subjugating their people;
their laws were obeyed, by force if necessary.
When the decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed, the people of
the subject lands were sent into a scurry of migration.
Returning to the towns of their lineage, the impoverished citizens of the empire were being
counted as evidence of Augustus’ power and reach.
So the night we celebrate as one of great joy
probably didn’t seem so for Mary and Joseph.
Mary had heard in a dream that she would bear this special child
and no matter how great her faith,
it’s doubtful that she was so certain as to be unaffected
by the physical sensations of late-term pregnancy.
Swollen belly and ankles, riding on a donkey or walking
the 80-mile trek from Nazareth to Bethlehem,
all to comply with the law, to be counted in the census
which would allow them the privilege of paying taxes to the Romans.
The birth itself certainly didn’t happen peacefully; no birth does.
The pain of childbirth for a teenager with no midwife or guide (except maybe the innkeeper’s
wife, as we heard in our pageant at 5pm),
must have been excruciating, lonely, exhausting,
anything but peaceful.
Enter the baby, who being very much alive at birth must have been very much screaming
announcing his presence not just with the herald of angels but with very full lungs,
no matter how godly, screaming as all babies do at the cruelty of life outside the womb.
The mix of emotions after that moment of birth must have been overwhelming:
Joy at holding this precious creature,
Feeling his warmth and the awesome reality of his humanity,
assessing fingers and toes and making sure that all was in working order
and wondering, wondering, how in the world all that had been predicted would come to pass.
No matter how great their faith, this was not a night of peace.
Mary’s song when she found out she was to bear the Messiah celebrated the toppling of
everything she – or anyone around her – knew.
The mountains and hills would be made low
The poor would be exalted, and the rich go away empty
The world would be turned upside down.
Not peaceful at all.
But what was there in the midst of it all?
What can offer us a clue to the divine peace that feels so elusive in our lives, and perhaps only
fleeting in our hearts?
In the midst of the chaotic, smelly scene
fresh birth, crying infant, tense parents, reluctant innkeepers
there was also a sense of peace.
I imagine Mary frantic with worry
about where their next meal would come from
and how they would make the journey home
and how she might go about the task of raising the Messiah
and then just taking one look at that new baby face
and knowing a different kind of peace.
Not a peace of stillness, exactly, and certainly not a peace of ‘everything’s okay’
But a sense of well-being against all odds,
a love so deep it drove her own foundations deeper
and let her know she could not be toppled.
That love is like a tether that keeps us anchored when the seas are choppy.
It is most celebrated in the form of mother and child, but all of us have access to it.
It’s the moment of deepest recognition of what connects us
in moments of humble silliness or deep need
in profound expressions of love and as we pass the butter at dinner.
In those moments of recognition and connection there is indeed peace.
Peace in knowing we are one,
no matter how battered we have been by the storms around us or within us.
Peace in the power of our love to heal,
and the love of others to heal us
Peace in the possibility that if enough of us carry forward these moments
And the actions they inspire
The world can know a whole new way of being.
It will not be calm.
It will not be quiet.
But it will be God’s peace:
the peace in which we share the miracle of our birth
and the splendor of our love
with the messiness of our humanity
and in so doing, we all are saved.