This was a year for cheer of the kind found in beer

IT’S the week before Christmas, I’m sitting at home In my wreck of a garden and writing a poem.

The roses are blooming, no cloud in the sky,

A handle of Harrington’s beer at my side,

And a goldfinch has perched on the top of the fence

To warble a song that makes just as much sense

As most of the stories that happened this year,

(Excuse me while I take a quick swig of beer).

Ebola broke out in impoverished places

And our tellies were full of distressing black faces,

But no one did anything until the disease Decided to go on a trip overseas, At which point the rich folk began to feel scared

And decided perhaps, after all, that they cared.

Ukraine was awash with fighting and shooting,

‘‘Don’t look at us,’’ exclaimed President Putin,

‘‘Our hands may be grimy but yours are much grimier

(Excuse me a sec while I annex the Crimea).’’

Down came a plane and more fingers were pointed

But piggy-eyed Putin’s convinced he’s anointed

As Czar of All Russia. He took off his shirt

And invited Obama to roll in the dirt.

‘‘I’m chest-beating manhood, come wrestle with me, ‘‘I’m ursine and ballsy and ex-KGB, ‘‘I’m Vladimir Putin whom nothing can trouble.’’

Then oil prices tumbled and with them the rouble.

If it goes on like this, it’s not hard to see,

That his only way out will be to start world war three.

North Korea would like that. They hacked into Sony

And showed that the Hollywood stuff was all phoney,

That the stars didn’t shine, that Little Miss Jolie

Was talentless, shallow and egobound. ‘‘Holy

Smoke,’’ said Brad Pitt, but nobody else did.

We’d known all along that the place was a cesspit.

The North Koreans told Sony that if they released

A satire on Dear Leader Kim the Obese

They’d bomb all the theatres. And Sony said ‘‘Sorry

‘‘We’ll cancel the movie and burn every copy.’’

So bully boys triumphed, thanks very much,

While freedom of speech got a knee in the crotch.

Not much of a year then, but we should thank God it

Saw the last of the movies derived from the Hobbit.

They’ve led to this nation becoming the home Of Global Infantilisation Syndrome. Is there now a chance that up we’ll all grow?

Ha! The box office speaks and the answer is no.

We had an election, there seemed little doing

For everyone knew that John Key was a shoo-in.

The voters had always found him so delectable

And Cunliffe in contrast was quite unelectable.

Then Nicky reached into his big bag of tricks

And brought out the Dirty within Politics.

He painted a picture of someone to hate, a

Malice-drenched slime-ball called Cameron Slater, A bully and bastard appalling to see, But strange to relate he was mates with John Key.

Suddenly National and John Key were squirming

And it seemed for a while that momentum was turning

But even though Key had become less delectable

Cunliffe stood firm as the Great Unelectable.

Key’s behaviour was queer, but Dotcom’s was queerer.

He teamed up politically with Harawira.

The party they formed was an obvious joke

It got no votes at all; now Dotcom says he’s broke.

(I don’t know if I can believe that from him

But it’s not been a good year for fat men called Kim.)

After 10 pointless years and a trillion bucks

The Yanks left Iraq, saying ‘‘bye and good luck.

We’ve trained you some troops who, if ISIS come close, we’ll

Just blow them to pieces. Oh dear, they’ve got Mosul.’’

Since then the jihadists have shown us all why

It’s hard to fight soldiers who’re happy to die.

Now Syria’s rubble, Iraq is anarchic,

And Egypt’s acquitted the brutal Mubarak,

And the whole of the region’s divided on lines

Laid down in the people’s inflexible minds.

There’s Jew against Arab, there’s eastern v western,

There’s Sunni v Shia, Islamic v Christian, All of it utterly vain and absurd And making less sense than the song of the bird

That has perched on my fence at the end of the year.

Merry Christmas to all. And don’t run out of beer.

EVERYBODY loves a baby. It does not matter how old or how young you are, how tough or how gentle, when you pick up a baby you are holding in your hands a miracle of life. There is a connection that goes beyond words. You sense life at its most basic and most wonderful.

You are aware how fragile a life is. The baby in your hands is totally dependent, dependent on you and on others for warmth, for protection, for feeding, for leading into the bewildering world.

There is also something inspiring about a baby. You sense a life unfolding, and you have visions of the potential that is wrapped in this little bundle.

People always warm to the story of a baby, especially the story of a baby who is born against the odds, or who has come into the world in spite of danger or in unusual circumstances.

Think of the rush to hospital that did not quite make it, or the baby born in a war zone.

The biblical Christmas story is the story of a baby. It is a story that has been repeated and passed down through 2000 years.

It is a story that has touched the hearts of people with its simplicity and its humanity.

It tells of a family caught out by the decree of an Imperial Roman census, and forced to travel when they should have been at home waiting for their baby. It paints a picture of a little refuge snatched away from the hassle of a busy town. The baby named Jesus is born in a stable. He is the son of a peasant family, and has an immediate connection with the lowly shepherds and their domestic animals.

In Christian faith this simple human story is superimposed on a divine drama. The birth of Jesus is the point of contact between heaven and earth, between God and humanity.

All the charm of the story of a baby resting peacefully in a manger of hay is amplified if this baby is believed to be God coming into human life. The miracle of human life holds the miracle of divine life and the two come together in an act of divine love.

The story of the birth of Jesus was proclaimed in New Zealand exactly 200 years ago. The Maori chief Ruatara had met the colonial chaplain Samuel Marsden in Sydney, and he invited Marsden to bring his message to his people in northern New Zealand.

On Christmas Day 1814 Marsden came ashore in the Bay of Islands. There Ruatara had assembled his people, and they sat on upturned canoes as pews. Marsden preached and Ruatara explained.

His text was the Christmas story in the Gospel according to Luke, and especially the words of the angel: ‘‘I bring you good news of great joy which shall be for all people. Today in the city of David a saviour has been born for you.’’

He announced that a baby born in a stable of Bethlehem more than 1800 years earlier was a baby born into the human family of all ages, and that this child comes now into a place that at the time of the birth had no human population. He proclaimed that this distant story is a story ‘‘for you’’, and the baby at the centre of the story is a baby ‘‘born for you’’.

The story of Christmas continues to bring the gift of this baby to New Zealanders and people in all parts of the world. This story inspires the faith God shares in human life, and that through coming into the world in the simple form of a baby, God transforms human life.

A faith response means taking this baby into your hands with wonder and love.

The biblical story has been passed down through 2000 years.

Jim Pietsch is pastor of St Paul’s Lutheran Church in Mt Cook, Wellington. He wrote this on behalf of the Wellington Council of Churches.