By Father Myron J Pereira, Jesuit
Each great festival has multiple traditions, not just one, for each feast comes with many stories, many ways of celebration.
Christmas is probably the most popular feast in the world, and celebrated in different ways in different countries.
At its center, the feast celebrates the birth of a child, the divine Child, Jesus born of a young Jewish woman, his mother Mary, in a small town called Bethlehem in what is today Palestine.
Are the Christmas stories true?
The story of Jesus’ birth is recorded in St Luke’s Gospel in the New Testament of the Bible. It is a “faith story,” not a narrative empirically verifiable. Which means to say that Luke, the author, uses the birth of Christ to build up our faith, not to write a scientific account.
Nor is it a fable or fiction either. Fiction is an exercise of sheer imagination. While Luke does use imaginative details in his story, his main thrust is sacred: the Child born of his mother Mary is God’s Son, and will save the world.
Many who read these stories from the Gospels, often ask: but are they true? Did it all happen the way it is described?
We reply: They are not factually true and did not take place as described. For the Bible is not concerned with the facts, as with the meaning of these facts.
Salvation history
In other words, the truth of the Bible is not history, but “salvation history.” What’s this?
Throughout life we grow outwardly, we develop, we age and die, our public image being one of success or failure, triumph or disaster.
“Salvation history” is what goes on within us, within the “heart of man” unseen and unnoticed, where the real struggle goes on. It is here that we encounter the truth of our lives.
God’s word, the Bible speaks to our heart, not to our face.
The infancy stories
Actually, we don’t really know when Jesus was born. Dec 25 was a date chosen much later, when Christians supplanted a pagan Roman festival just after the winter solstice, Dec 22, when the days start to grow longer.
Its symbolism is that the birth of Christ, the Light of the world, destroys the spell of darkness.
Similarly, whether Jesus was actually born in Bethlehem or not, is secondary. Luke writes that he was “born in Bethlehem” because Bethlehem was David’s birthplace, and King David was Israel’s greatest king, and the ancestor of Jesus the Messiah.
There are other stories of Christmas, that of “the Three Kings,” for instance.
These were Wise Men or Magi, astrologers, from the East (and not kings), from where exactly, it’s not said, who saw the Star of this child of destiny in the night sky, and then traveled to Jerusalem to do him homage.
They found the Child Jesus with his parents, and offered him their gifts: gold, for royalty; incense, as he is divine; and myrrh, used in embalming, as he is also a mortal human being. This is St Matthew’s narrative of the birth of Jesus, at the beginning of his Gospel.
What then is the truth of Jesus’s birth stories? Their truth is that God chose to share our human condition, being born in a poor ordinary family, being persecuted even as a child, becoming a refugee in a strange country like many today; and that he brings healing and salvation to all men and women everywhere.
This is the meaning of the name Jesus, Isa, Yeshu, from the Hebrew Joshua, “God saves.” Also Emmanuel, “God is with us.”
Looking at Christmas today
Of course, you wouldn’t think of this looking at Christmas celebrations today. All that Christmas seems to mean is a shopping extravaganza.
Or a time to eat till you’re stuffed, and drink until you’re drunk. Such celebrations have removed the original meaning of Christmas completely, and focus only on material enjoyment.
A symbol of this is the Santa Claus figure, a portly old man in red who brings gifts to children in a sleigh drawn by reindeers, entering their homes at night when all are asleep
A caricature of the great 4th-century Greek bishop, Saint Nicholas of Myra, whose care for his people was legendary. “Santa Claus” is a twisted form of his name, and recalls his generosity.
This is a good example of how the sacred or spiritual element in a celebration is often downplayed or changed completely, to make it appeal to a larger mass of people, usually of another culture.
All great festivals tend to get distorted, the more they become globalized. In fact, the more universal a feast becomes, the more it is commoditized. Christmas is only one example of this.
Other Christmas symbols
Another symbol is the Christmas Tree in German, Tannenbaum, the fir tree. Evergreen and stately, this pine originally stood for constancy and faithfulness.
Today, it is found in homes, and decked with streamers, lights and tinsel, and with gifts for the family placed at its base.
Yet another symbol of Christmas is the Crib, the re-creation of the stable and the manger where the Christ Child was born in statuary and wooden sets.
We owe this tradition to St Francis of Assisi, a medieval saint from Italy who popularized the devotion to the human person of Jesus. Cribs are popular in homes, and are the focus of prayers during the Christmas season.
One last word about the music of Christmas, Christmas carols. An indispensable part of the Christmas tradition, they are sung by young and old, in modern and traditional forms, in churches, homes and on the street from house to house.
Their themes are biblical, lyrical and nostalgic, and no matter how often they are heard, they recreate the beauty of Christmas again and again. We end with an excerpt from the most beautiful carol of them all, “Silent Night”:
Silent Night, Holy Night.
All is calm, all is bright.
Round yon Virgin, Mother and Child,
Holy Infant, so tender and mild
Sleep in heavenly peace,
Sleep in heavenly peace! – UCA News
*The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official editorial position of UCA News.
