Christmas UU-style©
December 10, 2000
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland
Jane Thickstun, Celebrant

In our theologically diverse congregations, this one not the least of them, it is hard to be everything to everyone, and to avoid offending anyone. In attempting to do so, we often come out sounding as silly as those "Politically Correct" wishes. Some of you may feel left out this time of year. Maybe you come from a Jewish background and while you may celebrate Hannukah, it is not the major holiday that Christmas is, in secular terms as well as religious. Maybe some of you with neo-pagan leanings would prefer to celebrate the Winter Solstice, and if so, I encourage you to do so, and to invite the fellowship members to participate. Kwanzaa may have some appeal to those with African connections, yet I doubt that those are folks who feel left out this Christmas season. Since Christmas is a holiday with such an emphasis on family, probably the ones who feel most left out this holiday season are the ones who have no close family, or are separated from them for one reason or another. These are the people we need to be aware of most at this time of year, the ones we most need to be most concerned about including.

So how many of you will be celebrating Christmas in some fashion this year? How many of you have trouble with the religious meaning of the holiday?

Christmas is the biggest holiday of the year in our American culture today. We spend more money than at any other time of year, we decorate our houses, we go to parties, we drink eggnog and eat chocolate. What are we celebrating when we do all this?

One way of looking at it is to see Christmas as a secular holiday. The holiday we celebrate in this country has never really been only, or even mainly, about Jesus. Most of the traditions have entirely non-Christian and even purely secular sources. In a book called The Battle for Christmas, Stephen Nissenbaum traces how Christmas came to celebrated the way it is these days in America.

The Puritans in fact outlawed Christmas, which was celebrated much differently in those days than it is today. It was originally not more than a Christian veneer on a pagan celebration. Most of the Christian holidays were introduced to pagan cultures by coopting already existing holidays. In pre-Christian and even post-Christian agricultural societies, late December was a time of leisure and plenty. The harvest was in, the meat had been killed for the winter, but wasn’t frozen yet. After a period of hard work, the Christmas season was a time to relax and unwind, in other words, to "party." Nissenbaum says, "It was a time of heavy drinking when the rules that governed people’s public behavior were momentarily abandoned in favor of an unrestrained ‘carnival,’ a kind of December Mardi Gras."

With urbanization and industrialization, that kind of behavior became more threatening, and well-off, law-abiding citizens were afraid. In the course of a few decades, Christmas was turned into a domestic holiday, taking place indoors, within the secure confines of the family circle. Whereas once landowners gave food and drink to the peasants who lived on their land on Christmas; now the changing times and the domestication led to people giving instead to the dependents within their own household. Since the wife and kids already got to eat and drink the best of the household, the notion of the Christmas present came about - something you can get for those close to you that they don’t need or wouldn’t get for themselves. In order to create the illusion that the presents were gifts of the heart and not merely bought in the commercial market, Santa Claus and the Christmas tree were introduced.

So Christmas has historically been as much a secular holiday as a religious one. But does this mean it has no religious meaning? Or that we can ignore the meanings that Christianity imbues the holiday with if we are not Christian? What’s more, many of the stories and the songs revolve around the birth of Jesus. Is there a way we can find meaning in these that makes sense to us, so that we may sing and tell and listen with not just integrity, but with joy? Is it possible to make sense of the Christian symbolism in a way that it is meaningful to us as Unitarian Universalists?

The Christmas story is a story of a birth. I’m sure you all know that the birth stories in the bible are not accounts of eye-witnesses, but a story made-up long after the fact. If we are looking in them for literal truth, we look in vain. The intent was never to be a literal account, and we are free to interpret for our own age and circumstances, as we are with any work of literature.

The Christmas story is a story of the birth of a man whom some claim was the son of God. Of course as Unitarian Universalists, we know that we are all children of God–in other words, that each of us has a divine spark within. This story is about not just what this child Jesus represents, but what any child represents. It is an awesome thing--the largeness contained in such littleness. A baby contains all the capacity both for good and for ill which any person has the potential to bring into the world. Every child is what Jesus was--a child of God, an incarnation of an as-yet unrealized creativity, a potential Redeemer. Every child is a symbol of Incarnation, symbol of Advent--of what is to come. Each night a child is born is a holy night. It not a unique, but a universal event. That is why the myth still lives in the hearts and minds of so many. Each of us carries a piece of the divine within us, whether we know it or not, whether we care about it or not, whether we choose to even remember it or not.

The Christmas story is a story of a lowly birth. Once in Royal David’s City, all paid homage to the lowly babe lying in a manger–the star, the shepherds, the wise men. It serves to remind us to pay homage to those less fortunate than us, that the divine is not only within each of us, but within the least of those who inhabit the earth. All children of God deserve our gifts. In remembering the poor at this time of year, and those less fortunate, we are paying homage to the divine principle that exists in all of us.

As the story of a birth, the Christmas story is also about the birth of something new. It is a symbol of rebirth and renewal; a reminder that the divine is within me and you, and that we have the potential to be like Jesus was. In remembering that the divine seed exists within us, we honor the creative principle in ourselves. And just as the king was born in a manger, that creative principle may not show up as a talent for writing symphonies. It needs to be recognized, nurtured and honored, no matter how small or insignificant it may seem.

In the words of UU minister, Barbara Rohde, "Christmas reminds us that the truly divine, the gifts of the spirit, can only enter the world through us. Christmas reminds us that spirit is more than inner feeling; it must be made incarnate in the world as truth spoken, as beauty created, as love and compassion given. Deep joy comes in feeling the quiet, secret movement of the child within us; but the greater joy, and what we are called to do, is to labor to bring forth that child and let it live in the world. . . . A few births are easy. Children arrive almost before we know it The right words are there on the tip of our tongue. The simple loving act was done spontaneously, almost without thought. But most births are truly acts of labor; some are long and difficult and filled with pain. When the child is born, there are thousands of Herods around us who would slay it through violence or neglect or indifference. Yet our fear of Herod is overcome by the joy of birth. Rejoice. Rejoice. For unto us a child is born. And the story of Christmas tells us that we, too, are part of the holiness of creation." (In the Simple Morning Light, p. 16)

"Why not a star? Some bright star shines somewhere in the heavens each time a child is born. Who knows what it may foretell? Who knows what uncommon life may yet again unfold, if we but give it a chance?"

We can explain the star now. It was in all probability a super nova in its dying burst of fire. We can understand it as a natural phenomenon. Yet we don’t have to thereby rob it of its symbolic nature. It can be a perfectly understood natural occurrence, and at the same time still be "a fitting symbol for the birth of one whose uncommon life has been long remembered," and for all birth of all potential, all possibility.

The Christmas story is not just one story. Christmas stories abound, and all are as true as the one in the gospel. All share a germ of wisdom that speaks to the spirit of this season. I’d like to share a poem by Jim Wickman:

The last few leaves hang limply on the tree
... and clouds scud low in the sky;
The winds sing louder than a murmur
... and rain drops pelt down;We choose to be inside where it's warm, and tell stories.

We tell stories . . . and we may wonder,
"What do the stories tell us ?"
We tell the story of two lovers who each sacrificed
their most precious treasure out of love for each other . . .
What does the story tell us ?

We tell the story of a strange being who stole all the things from a town,
and awoke to find that he had not upset their lives one whit . . .
What does the story tell us ?

We tell the story of strange happenings in the sky
and an unbelievable birth on Earth and the life that followed . . .
What does the story tell us ?

We tell the story of a young girl with a question
and the answer given her by an adult
who wrote with wisdom for all who are young or old . . .
What does the story tell us ?

We tell the story of a miser who experienced the pain and the joy
of Past and Present and Future all in one night . . .
What does the story tell us ?

Perhaps each story tells us that it is a "true story"
embodying a wisdom which reaches beyond mere fact to touch Truth . . .
Perhaps each story tells us that
even in this darkest time of year there is reason to hope . . .
and to expect that our hope will become reality . . .
Perhaps each story tells us that
the promise of tomorrow must begin in the fullness of today.

So come, oh come, Emmanuel. Come into our midst and give us peace and hope. Come into our hearts and remind us of our possibility. Come and remind us that we ourselves are the Incarnation, but that we also are the creators and must make incarnate the divine within.

I’d like to end with a poem by Anthony Friess Perrino, another UU minister:

Drab is the life,
and sighfully long,
which never has heard
an angel’s song.

Dark is the night
whose sky-full of space
is starless of fancy
with its promise of grace.

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland is recognized by the Unitarian Universalist Association as a Welcoming Congregation. We welcome, affirm, promote and celebrate the full participation of all persons in all of our activities without regard to age, gender, sexual orientation, race or any other such category of exclusion.

Please feel free to contact us with any feedback, corrections or questions at jaham@delta.edu