'Once Again'

We have been receiving duplicated newsletters from many friends this month. Invariably they begin with such words as ‘once again the time has come round for us to bring you up to date with what’s been happening to us’. So we get news of family events, some sad, some triumphant, all important to the writers as they review another year of their life.

In the last few weeks over 7,000 people have visited these blogs. Most perhaps have been people who are getting on in years as I am, and for such people Christmas can be a time of indulgence as we remember events that often go far back into our childhood. Whilst new experiences will be celebrated, inevitably older ones will be cherished too.

I have vivid memories of my childhood Christmases, my father working until Christmas Eve and then bringing home the turkey from Smithfield in the City of London, later to be matched by a side of ham which would be my grandpa’s contribution to Christmas lunch (with his anticipated comment ‘m-m-m, alright but not as good as last year’). I remember some of the presents – the smaller ones opened in bed from pillowcases full of gifts sneaked in whilst my sister and I were asleep and the big ones like the steam engine one year, which provided endless pleasure for the adults who thought it too dangerous for me to operate alone.

I often meet people for whom Christmas is a bitter prospect because of the death of someone who shared happier times through the years. It has been a sad year for my family, with two significant deaths and old friends battling with illness, all reminding us that life is transitory. Alongside such personal loss, the appalling violence and sectarian hatred in Africa and the Middle East has saddened me as the duplicity and ineptness of politicians has angered me. It has not been a particularly good year, and it’s understandable that old memories can prove more sustaining than recent ones.

However, in September our youngest daughter and her partner became the parents of a dear little boy and he will be at the centre of our family Christmas this year. My wife and I were at a Carol Service last Sunday and when we heard the words ‘Unto us a child is born’, there was a new resonance to those familiar words and a breath of renewed hope.

So for any who may read this, may your Christmas go well, and may there be justice and peace on earth and all its peoples.

B.R.

Christmas and what we do with it

There has been a hyped-up controversey about Christmas in the British press and media during the last few days. Some have said that it has lost its religious significance in society and become a mid-winter festival, rather than the celebration of the birth of Jesus. The triumph of secularism! However others have had scruples about the danger of a Christian festival appearing to dominate other religions, and therefore being a cause of offence to them, and this has become part of the discussion. (Incidently my experience is that most religions are happy to share in the festivals of other faiths, as happens in many of our schools.)

Bishops have had their say. Seeing themselves as guardians of Christian tradition, they have been saying solemn things about it all, apparently not recognising that they may be part of the problem, if problem there is. Older people such as I am and perhaps you are, might be tempted to agree with them, easily infected by the ‘things aren’t what they used to be’ syndrome. A few things to say about this.

First, 'things' have never been what they used to be. As I have said before, nostalgia can be the enemy of truth. Throughout my life, Christmas in Britain has primarily been the people’s mid-winter festival and a time to focus on the strength and resilience of the family. Only for some people has it always been a time for the worship of God and a joyful expression of faith. Secondly - the Church has to accept what most people recognise, that the U.K. is a secular state. Thirdly, the presence of other faiths, often with a more rigorous agenda than most of the British churches, means that whilst inter-faith dialogue is valuable, the bonding element in Western society is citizenship not religion. The churches have to live with that, and not try to drag people to where most of them have never been and may not wish to be.

The other thing that may be worth saying is that the Bishops have a point. Christians are sometimes a disappointing crowd, talking only to themselves. They have done – still do – some daft things. But their mistakes have to be balanced against the gross and ugly excesses of materialistic secularism: the ‘me-society’ as some call it. For some (not me)the Nativity may only be a story, but its narrative of animals of the field, the common people, and the people of wisdom and power, together bowing before the birth of a newly born child who brings hope and love and joy ‘to all the world’, has the power of profound truth. In dramatic contrast to the heedless grabbing culture of modern society.

In the end, Christmas is about gift not greed. That is more than sufficient cause for a celebration in which everyone can join.
B.R.