Monday morning musings

I am writing this following our children's service. What was wonderful about the service is that the program was the re-telling of the birth story of Jesus from Matthew and Luke. I have had many people comment so often about the Christmas season being one of shopping, feasting, family, and often not one of remembering what the holiday is supposed to be about. Christmas was been preempted by our secular society. What is interesting is that this is not new. I am reading a book on the Battle over Christmas. The author traces the concerns about Christmas throughout history especially looking at 1600's in England and the United States.
The early church did not celebrate the birth of Christ for many centuries. It was only after concerns about pagan celebrations that Christmas began to be celebrated. December was chosen even though from what we can determine in Scripture the actual birth of Jesus probably occurred in the spring nearer to Passover. December was chosen as there was a major Roman festival, Saturnus, around the winter solstice. The festival was one of excessive drinking, immorality. It was also a time when the poor of the people were not expected to work and that the well-to-do were to offer charity to the poor.
The early church struggled with the immorality of the season and came up with the idea of celebrating the birth of Christ at the same time. As one can see, there are similarities in the way we celebrate now as well as then, with the festival. Over the years that tradition continued. In England and the States this continued to be a time of excessive drinking and other vices. In fact the Puritans banned celebration of Christmas in the Northeastern states for over 60 years. Their concern was that Christmas was not scriptually based and led to nothing but problems.
The other major insight about Christmas as we celebrate this holiday in the US is Santa Claus. The idea of Santa probably did not come from the Dutch Saint Nicholas. Our image of Santa was the marketing idea of Macy's in the late 1800's.
Today we have been so inundated with secular and pagan imagery combined with Christian symbols it is difficult to tell where one begins and one ends. To have a festival to celebrate the beginning of the light returning to our hemisphere and for the harvest, is by itself not wrong. To insist that this has to do with the birth of Christ in the way we celebrate, is cause for reflection on all of our parts. Sharing with those who are less fortunate should not be a one time of year process but occur daily. That is why it was so important for us to remember the stories that supposed to shape us. It is not a matter of either or but of and both.