Christmas - How will it be for You?

It's the Fourth Sunday of Advent as I write. Last Sunday we thought about St. John the Baptist and today, the Blessed Virgin Mary. These two are the two through whom God was able to manifest himself amongst his creation and carry out His mission as one of them. That is, as a human being. Both were essential for the salvation of the world through Jesus Christ. Both of them were essential to God reconciling the world to himself.

St. John the Baptist

But rather than continuing in the heights of theology, I want to let these characters and snippets of their stories shed a light on our own very human emotions surrounding Christmas and the response we have to the prospect of celebrating it as we move through the remaining days of Advent. And to help us I want to include as well, John's parents Zechariah and Elizabeth, and Mary as a potential parent herself.

On the Third Sunday of Advent this year we've met John in prison; put there by King Herod because he called out and criticized Herod for marrying his sister-in-law Herodius. Herodius wanted John dead. But Herod had some respect for John and a sort of curiosity about him. So prison was a compromise. And it's from prison that John sends two of his own disciples to Jesus to ask him, 'Are you the one that is to come or should we expect another?'

Maybe John has been brooding in prison and doubts have set in about Jesus. Even though not too long ago he'd shouted to the crowd that Jesus was the Lamb of God and had baptised him in full view of everybody; even heard the voice from heaven say 'This is my Son in whom I am well pleased'. Even so, he'd had time to think and rethink as he languished incarcerated. And it looks as though another prison, that of doubt, began to surround him.

Jesus doesn't give John's disciples a straight answer, a simple yes or no. 'Believing in Him' doesn't ordinarily come as easy as that. He says to look around and tell John what they see, 'the lame walk, the deaf hear, the blind see and the dead are raised to life,'

So what did John expect of Jesus? It seems he wasn't getting entirely what he expected. And doubt was the result. His story didn't end well. But not because of the doubt, as it happens. The doubt was, maybe, the result of too much thinking time to himself.

Now to John's parents Zechariah and Elizabeth. Zechariah was a priest and his wife Elizabeth of the priestly family descended from Aaron. They were devout, righteous, observing all the demands and commandments of their religion. They had done so all their lives. And now they were old. The one thing missing from their lives was children. And both of them, very much of Jewish tradition, felt the disgrace and shame this meant, in their culture, for them both.

Zechariah, chosen by lot one day to burn incense at the altar in the temple is going about his business behind the curtain when he's visited by God's chief messenger, the Archangel Gabriel and told that Elizabeth will have a son and he's to call him John. The account in the Bible tells us that he was terrified at the appearance. And who wouldn't be? But then the disappointment, disillusionment and dismay of decades of unanswered prayer seem to come crashing in on him and he responds 'How do I know this is true?'

'Because I'm from God and I'm telling you so,' was in essence what Gabriel replied. But the penalty for Zechariah's doubt was that he would be struck dumb until John was born. So doubt at the presence of God active in the world and doubt at God's working in Zechariah's and Elizabeth's own lives was their very human response, devout though they were. And as we've seen, years later, doubt would encroach upon their son's response to God working in the world.

The Blessed Virgin Mary
The Panagia Portaitissa Icon

A few months later Gabriel is on his Master's business again and this time visits Mary to tell her that she will conceive a son and she is to name him Jesus. At the meeting with Gabriel, Mary we are told is 'perplexed' and 'ponders on what it could mean'. I like to think that in that moment, she like Zechariah was 'struck dumb', but just for a few moment, as the weight of what she was being told sunk in. But after the initial shock her response wasn't doubt, but a sense of awe and wonder at what God was doing in her life. 'Let it be to me according to your word', she says. Mary's response to God's working in the world and in her own life was at that moment at least, awe, wonder and faithful acceptance. 

So, when you come to hear again about the events of that first Advent and Christmas and think about what they mean for you and for the world, what will your response be? At the end of all your thinking, when your reason has given up because it's all too much to cope with intellectually, what are you left with? Probably the emotional response of either doubt or awe? Or somewhere in between swinging from one to the other?

Santa Claus - The Guy's a real Legend

On 6th December every year, the Church worldwide remembers and gives thanks for Santa Claus!

St. Nicholas - Bishop of Myra
An Icon from Mount Athos Greece

Well, to be specific, St. Nicholas; the original and only and for ever abiding, Santa Claus, who was bishop of  Myra in the 4th century in what is now southern Turkey. He was a great champion of the orthodox Christian faith and was one of the signatories of the first Council of Nicea, where the Creed of the Christian faith was agreed. St. Nicholas was notable, amongst other things, as a man of great compassion and generosity; and it's from this that the traditions and stories around him, including that of being a miracle worker, grew.

The particular story about St. Nicholas which eventually had him evolve into Santa Claus appears in a few variations. But the one I like best goes something like this:

In the town where St. Nicholas lived, there was a poor man who had three daughters, each a year apart in age. But the man was so poor that he couldn't afford dowries so that his daughters could be married. He was at his wits end, and took the awful decision that his daughters would have to raise the money by becoming prostitutes.

St. Nicholas heard about this so,  when the first daughter was old enough, and wanting to stay anonymous, he came by night to the poor man's house and threw a bag of gold through an open window, so saving the girl from an awful fate. A year later when the next daughter had to think about marriage, St. Nicholas did the same, bringing a bag of gold, by night and throwing it through the window opening. When the third daughter became eligible for marriage, St. Nicholas came to the house again, by night, but this time, all the windows being closed, he climbed on the roof of the house and threw the bag of gold down the chimney.

Now, it just so happened that the daughter had washed her stockings that evening and hung them by the mantlepiece to dry, and the bag of gold that St. Nicholas threw down the chimney fell into the girl's stocking. And so all three of the girls were saved.

Well, it might be a story, but in every story in the Christian tradition there's some truth or Truth. This story in particular gives an insight into St. Nicholas's great generosity and compassion, which has been enshrined in the giving of gifts either on 6th December in some countries around the world or on Christmas Day as in the UK. So in that way, the spirit of St. Nicholas lives on today.

I think it's a great shame to consign Santa Claus to the level of fiction and fairy tale. St. Nicholas was in his time what we would say of any person who's some sort of hero these days, colloquially - 'A Legend'. And I like to believe that he's a living legend that shows up in at least a couple of images today.

There's the larger than life 'Ho ho ho' character we see in grottoes at Christmas Fairs and shopping centres at this time of the year, complete with his sack of gifts, giving presents to children, and who comes down the chimney when everybody's asleep on Christmas Eve and leaves just what we wanted.

 And then there's the one that I prefer nowadays, who we see as more of a mystical figure, amongst the decorations around the house. He carries a 'man bag' and a Christmas Tree over his shoulder. Often there's a child or two with him. He's for me the one that lives and moves between the dimensions of past and present and future. He's kindly, but a little intimidating. He can appear at will to turn a nightmare into a dream and makes dreams come true.

Both of these characters turn sadness into joy, bring light into darkness and spread love and hope and faith into a world that can serve up so much tragedy. And whenever we give gifts to others that do the same for them, at whatever time of year, then we can honestly say that we believe in Santa Claus, because it's in the same spirit that St. Nicholas gave that we are giving too. It's the way that God gives and the way in which Jesus Christ gave himself out of love.

Yes, Santa Claus is a real, living legend!

The Prayer of St. Nicholas' Day:

Almighty Father, lover of souls,
who chose your servant Nicholas
to be a bishop in the Church,
that he might give freely out of the treasures of your grace:
make us mindful of the needs of others
and, as we have received, so teach us also to give;
through Jesus Christ our your Son our Lord.

Ho, Ho, Ho! Merry Christmas!

A 'Mystical' Santa

A Santa Claus from Skiathos Greece