Monday, December 24, 2012

Saying Merry Christmas

It's Christmas Eve, 2012, and there is much bad news from around the world.  Syria is engulfed in civil war--civilians were bombed over the weekend waiting in line for bread.  Congress and the President have all left Washington without an agreement to prevent us from falling off the fiscal cliff.  A Navy Seal in Afghanistan committed suicide.  More children were buried over the weekend after the shootings in Newtown, CT, while the NRA calls for armed guards in schools.  How can we even consider thinking, much less saying, "Merry Christmas!"

Yet none of this is new, indeed the first Christmas was a rather bleak time for the people like Mary and Joseph.  An unexpected pregnancy, poverty all around, their nation occupied by foreign troops . . . no, it wasn't a merry time back then either.  But still, when Mary ahd learned she would give birth to the Messiah, she sang a song of praise:  "My soul magnifies the Lord!"  And she held out hope that in and through him, things would get better.

The world is still full of evil and wrong.  Greed and corruption are real.  Hatred hasn't gone away.  But what the one born on that day so long ago taught us is that we can either give in to the bad or claim the good.  We can either break down and cry, or we can stand up and rejoice.  For the good news this and every Christmas, is that the bad news isn't going to win.  And even as Mary was mother to the Christ child, so we can give birth to the Holy One with every act of trust and kindness and love.  And bit by bit, act by act, the good news will triumph over the bad.

Saying "Merry Christmas" isn't naive--but it most certainly is an act of faith!  Faith that ultimately must lead to action.  So, "Merry Christmas!"  Might it be filled with promise as you move into the new year.

(Photo:  The Sanibel Congregational UCC sanctuary--Bruce Findley, photographer)

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