The Christmas Illusion

Years ago I heard someone talk longingly about their past experiences of Christmas, lamenting how commercial and complicated Christmas had become. This person spoke of childhood memories of Christmas. "Christmas was much simpler then," is how the matter was stated.

He spoke of going to Christmas Eve services as a child . . . his fascination with candles lit and held by persons across the worship space . . . the beauty of the Christmas carols sung by hundreds of worshipers on that holy night . . . the colors and smells in the worship place . . . seeing everyone dressed up for that very special service. In retelling the childhood memories, there was the longing for "simplicity" and "simpler times."

It caused me to consider my own experiences of Christmas as a child. I thought of several things that had seemed very basic to my experiences of Christmas in Oklahoma; upon further consideration, however, I realized that they were actually not simple at all. What I experienced as "simple" was, in fact, hard work for someone else.

Christmas Eve services required ministers to preside, choirs to sing, ushers to ush, persons to prepare the space beforehand and to clean the space afterwards. My part? I got to attend and then go home.

Large family gatherings required that someone clean house, gather groceries, prepare the meal, and then clean up the mess afterwards. My part? I ate the meal and then took a nap.

You see how it goes. . . .

When I became a parent, I realized that my work was only beginning when the children went to bed on Christmas Eve. Of course, they wanted to stay up late to get a peek at Santa Claus. So even after going to bed, they lay there unable to sleep. Or sometimes they faked sleep in order to get an early glimpse of their Christmas presents.

Thus, it was usually very late when someone (you've guessed who!) had to assemble the bicycles, set up the toys, wrap last-minute gifts, or -- the most stupid idea I ever had -- set up the trampoline in the backyard, beginning around midnight. When the kids went to bed, well, that was the beginning of my night! There was nothing simple about it . . . except the perception.

That the season is or should be simple is an illusion . . . usually carried from childhood. It is the Christmas illusion. Advent and Christmas are no simpler than any other season of daily life.

So you might hear things like, "We (folks tend to speak in "we" language about these kinds of illusions rather than "I" statements) need to get back to the real meaning of Christmas."

The real meaning of Christmas is that Christ comes into our world, that Jesus is embodied in our lives, that God took on flesh to live among us and within us.

I don't need to run off and hide in a hole to live out that real meaning of Christmas. I am invited, rather, to engage life as it is, not as I wish it to be.

In truth, spirituality is not an escape from the real, not a way to hide from responsibilities and relationships. It is, rather, a different way to engage what is real. It is a way of entering into life as it is, not life as we wish it would be. Spirituality means engagement and encounter, not escape.

So it is of no use for me to try creating a "perfect Christmas" or to get back to some idealized notion of what we should see and feel through Advent and Christmas.

The perfect Christmas is not the one where we hide our heads in the sand, but rather the one in which we engage life-as-it-is with and for God.