I’m one of those nut-bars who still thinks there something of relevance to be learned from the Bible’s account of what has historically morphed into what I now call “the Dec. 25 thing.”
Perhaps I should remind those of you who slept through or failed History 101 that there is no credible evidence that Jesus was born anywhere around the day we now label Dec. 25. In fact, if you’ve been listening to musings emanating from the Vatican of late, you will know that Pope Benedict even questions whether we’ve accurately identified the right year for the birth of Christ! By his calculations - perhaps garnered by some new app on his iPhone - the date up in the corner of this page should be more like 2016 or maybe 2008 if the traditional BC/AD (designations that few use anymore) dividing line is to coincide with the actual year of Christ’s birth.
Ok, now that I’ve thoroughly confused you and reminded you why you don’t go to church anymore, let me tear you away from Wikipedia to explain myself.
You may vaguely recall that following several centuries in the Common Era (or AD) of bloody Roman emperors who aggressively did their best to destroy the Christian church, a fellow by the name of Constantine came to power. Depending on which historian(s) you’re inclined to believe, Constantine had what might best be described as an “interesting” relationship to Christianity culminating in an attempt to “Christianize” the empire. Part of such an endeavour was his effort to synchronize the celebration of the birth of Christ with (some would prefer the term “sanctify”) the pagan celebration of the winter solstice and its accompanying veneration of the Sun god.
Was the Fourth-century Caesar successful in his noble objective? Ha – write me a 1,000-word essay defending your answer and submit it by next Wednesday at noon! Fact is, there has been an uneasy “marriage” between the Christian celebration of Christ’s birth and various pagan celebrations ever since. (I once lit up the phone-lines on a local talk-show by suggesting that if we wanted a truly distinctive celebration of the birth of Christ, we might begin by selecting an arbitrary date like May 14 or Aug. 9 to celebrate, but that’s another story.)
In any event, given what we have to work with, I conspire as best I can amidst the commercial orgy that North Americans call Christmas to extract something of value from the Biblical narratives that address the birth of Christ. This brings me to this matter of the Advent Conspiracy I will address for the next several weeks here in the City View. Conspiracy, as you know, is indeed present in St. Matthew’s description of Christ’s birth. In response to Herod’s bald-faced lie to the wise-men from the East that he too wished to worship the newborn child upon their identification of where he might do so, a dream specifically directed the sages to return to Toronto via Calgary rather than via Edmonton, if you get my drift. In other words, they outsmarted Herod by, literally, not getting back to him.
Here’s the point. If you are at all concerned to include or preserve a meaningful place for Christ in your Christmas celebrations, it’s going to require some intentional engagement of the grey matter. Begin by identifying the foolishness of giving more and more to people who actually don’t even need what you’re bestowing! Ask yourself: what makes me think I’m entitled to drink egg-nog when a large percentage of people in the world are perishing for want of pure water to drink? Then proceed accordingly.
Conspiratorial? Whatever! I prefer to think of it as the kind of wisdom that characterized those who were among the first worshipers of the Christ-child.
Tim Callaway is pastor of Faith Community Baptist Church. He can be reached at [email protected]
