We are drawn to Christmas asit speaks to the child we once were

NO other time of the year touches us like Christmas time. And it is here!

Just the mention of the word Christmas sparks off a welter of conflicting emotions.

Many – on hearing the first tinny rendition of Bing Crosby’s White Christmas – punctuated by the shrill announcement of special offers, tend to be overcome by feelings of mild panic.

Visions of shopping – of presents, cards, baking, decorating and Santa Claus – threaten to overwhelm us all.

For others, it is a lonely time – a very sad time – a time of memories, good and bad, a time when the absence of a loved one is almost too much to bear.

Christmas is not a tidy time. Things intrude, memories come unbidden, sometimes unwanted and we are not in control. And yet, again and again we are seduced by the magic of Christmas. Despite all the talk of commercialism, it is a hard heart that is not touched in some small way by the spirit of the season.

People sometimes say that Christmas is only for children. Jesus once said something similar about the kingdom of God – ‘unless you become like little children..’ In honesty, Christmas speaks to the child that we once were, that is why we are touched by it; that is why we are drawn to it and by it. Perhaps the child in us is buried deep, covered by the baggage of adult life, the dreams that did not materialise, the hopes that were either dashed or remain unfulfilled, the promises not kept, the hurts suffered and inflicted, the experience of not making the cut in the tiger economy. In a world where success is often only measured in how much we earn in a year, the need to stay close to our humanity becomes all the more imperative. 2000 years ago in Bethlehem, the inns were all full to capacity. The strange irony is that we have none of the names of the rich and famous who were successfully booked in. The only people who stayed in Bethlehem that we know of are the people who stayed in a manger. And such is the abiding message of Christmas. Our lives are not measured in terms of status or economics; they are measured in humanity, in dignity, in the ability to care. And this abiding message is all about us, in children singing in carol services or performing in Nativity plays, in parties for ‘ the more senior citizens’ of our parishes, in the many now making the journey by land or sea to be at home with family for Christmas, in children being brought to see the Crib, in the unique atmosphere of Midnight Mass, in the return to Church of one who has been absent for some time, ‘no questions asked’, all a touch of life in the dead of Winter.

Somebody once said that the birth of a child is God’s opinion that life should continue. If it can be said of the birth of every baby, how much more it can be said of the birth of the Christ child? God has spoken decisively, universally and eternally. Only from here can any understanding be arrived at, any purpose found, any plan formulated.

And then there are those who say that Christmas has lost its religious significance, that it has become far too commercial. This is as untrue as it is true. In the words of Patrick Kavanagh, Christ is to be found in the bits and pieces of every day – ‘a laugh, a kiss and sometimes tears.’ It has never been otherwise for ‘ The Word became flesh and lived among us...’

Once we accept this, the things we consider to be the trappings of Christmas, the things we complain hide Jesus from us, become the very things in which he is revealed.

Jesus is not to be found in the abstract, in some sort of holy vacuum. He is found in the very substance of our lives and of our living, in the laughter, the kisses and the tears that are Christmas.

This Christmas, may we be blessed in finding Christ – like the wisemen once did – in the unexpected but familiar places that are our lives.