[Taking a two-week break. Today (Dec. 22) is not Christmas Eve but, sadly, this 2023 Christmas Eve post is still poignant.]
* * *
They shall beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation;
they shall study war no more.
—Isaiah 2.4
* * *
All I want for Christmas is peace on earth. And if that’s too much to ask, I’ll settle for peace in the Middle East.
Tomorrow is Christmas. Tonight churches will be full. The faithful will come to adore the Christ child. (Skeptics and atheists will get over themselves.) Choirs will sing. Bells will ring. Lessons will be read.
The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
on them light has shined.
Candles will be lit from hand to hand along the pews. Light will shine in the darkness. “Silent Night” will be sung.
But tonight it’s gonna be hard to sing “all is calm” when bombs are falling round mother and child in Gaza.
Sing anyway.
Let your tears fall. The holy child of Bethlehem weeps with you. Heavenly hosts weep with you too.
Tonight there’s a child bathed in goodness and light and another bathed in hatred and bitterness plotting death and destruction for its mortal enemy.
There will be blood.
There will be retribution.
There will be no peace.
Not yet. Not tomorrow.
But don’t give up. Keep hope alive.
For all the boots of the tramping warriors
and all the garments rolled in blood
shall be burned as fuel for the fire.
Jesus was born under Roman occupation in Bethlehem in what we now call the West Bank. Jesus stood for peace, love, and justice. He stood with the oppressed. He was an avatar of love. The Romans crucified him.
As it turns out, you can kill the messenger, but you can’t kill the message. And that message resounds through all times, on every mountaintop, and in every heart.
Love is the way, the truth, and the life. Love is the way to peace.
Many people see the birth of Jesus as historical. Particular. I once did too. But now I see it as mythical. Universal.
Which is to say: Christmas is not just about the birth of the messiah in Bethlehem. It’s about the birth of the messiah in us.
O holy child of Bethlehem, be born in us today.
You are the song the angels sing.
You are the light that shines in darkness.
* * *
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