The spirits of Christmas

 We haven't quite finished our Christmas shopping this year but we think we can see the end from here. The routine of parking the Jeep, putting on a face mask, putting on gloves, going into a store, etc. is less fun than other years when we didn't have to feel as guarded. People are friendly and all behind their masks but, probably because we watched to many "westerns" when we were young, seeing people in masks makes us think of outlaws, when the real outlaws these days are those not wearing masks.

Lots of folks think wearing a mask is an infringement on their rights. We wonder if they've thought about the events described in the gospel, according to Luke:

In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. ² (This was the first census that took place while^[a] Quirinius was governor of Syria.) ³ And everyone went to their own town to register.

⁴ So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David.

 

Mary, Joseph, and child

Photo by J. Harrington

Now most (we hope all) of you realize that there was a census taken of US this year. We did not have to travel to our own town to register. There is no emperor to issue such a decree, although we came close this past November and December. We have much freedom, perhaps more than is good for US. Have we lost all sense of community? Are we foregoing as much as we can in the way of mutual obligations? Do we, these days, judge our actions by what we can get away with; what is legal; abandoning the concept of what is right and moral and ethical? Have we traded the Golden Rule for a world in which gold rules?

As, and if, we understand it, in the Old Testament Book of Genesis God said to Adam and Eve something like: "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it...." These days it appears that we have more than honored that mandate. Is it time for a newer testament? One in which we learn how to inhabit the earth without destroying it and ourselves? Can we find new scribes and prophets that we are willing to listen to? Is it time to drive the money-changers from the temple? Would that not be in alignment with the real spirit of Christmas? Have you watched A Charlie Brown Christmas this year?

Once the World Was Perfect

By Joy Harjo

Once the world was perfect, and we were happy in that world.

Then we took it for granted.

Discontent began a small rumble in the earthly mind.

Then Doubt pushed through with its spiked head.

And once Doubt ruptured the web,

All manner of demon thoughts

Jumped through—

We destroyed the world we had been given

For inspiration, for life—

Each stone of jealousy, each stone

Of fear, greed, envy, and hatred, put out the light.

No one was without a stone in his or her hand.

There we were,

Right back where we had started.

We were bumping into each other

In the dark.

And now we had no place to live, since we didn't know

How to live with each other.

Then one of the stumbling ones took pity on another

And shared a blanket.

A spark of kindness made a light.

The light made an opening in the darkness.

Everyone worked together to make a ladder.

A Wind Clan person climbed out first into the next world,

And then the other clans, the children of those clans, their children,

And their children, all the way through time—

To now, into this morning light to you.

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