“It’s the most wonderful time of the year—with the kids jingle-belling and everyone telling you, ‘Be of good cheer!’ It’s the most wonderful time of the year!”
I love Christmas . . . I really do. Despite anything you are about to read, I do love Christmas. I love the songs. The lights. Our Christmas tree with the angel on top. The turkey and dressing. The colorful packages under the tree. Attending a Christmas Eve service. My mom’s cinnamon rolls on Christmas morning. The turkey and dressing. The holiday movies. The decorations my wife puts out all through the house. Family gatherings. The turkey and dressing . . . pretty much all of it.
But over the years some of my feelings about Christmas have certainly been changing. Part of that change had to do with my family rediscovering a religious meaning to the holiday that had been missing during my early childhood. That rediscovery led to new family traditions such as the annual setting out of the nativity scene. Attending Christmas Eve services at various churches in the cities where we have lived. Adding more religious ornaments to the mix of ornaments on the tree. More giving to the poor and less shopping for each other. And in my ministry it has led to sermons in December which shift our focus from the holiday shopping season to the season of Advent.
That shift has also led to an increasing concern over the commercialization and materialism of Christmas. “Concern” is no longer an adequate word. I moved a few years ago from “concern” to “displeasure” at the continuing expansion of the shopping season till Christmas displays seemed to show up in stores on Labor Day. And then to “disgust” as year after year news reports spread of fights breaking out among frenzied parents trying to get the latest hot item for their already spoiled children.
But now the Christmas avarice has descended to a new low.
In the mad rush of shoppers on the morning after Thanksgiving, a Walmart employee was trampled to death by a stampede frantic to get their hands on whatever was on sale. Trampled to death! Like a cowboy who fell off his horse before a crazed herd of cattle. Trampled to death!
He gave his life in service to . . . to what? To his country, in an act of selfless bravery defending life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? To his family, working in a dangerous occupation to put food on the table? To citizens in danger, braving calamity or crime to protect precious innocent lives?
No, he gave his life in service to a horde of bargain hunters so desperate to save a few bucks, to secure some highly prized piece of merchandise, to be the first one on the block to have whatever it is that everyone on the block wants to have, that they abandoned all sense of order, propriety, courtesy, decency, even humanity.
His was not the only death that day. Something died in that mob. Call it “the Christmas Spirit” (but I suspect that may have died in them some time ago). Call it “love for one’s fellow man.” Call it “human decency.” Whatever you call it, in that moment at least, they killed not only another human being, they killed something in themselves.
Or maybe, it was already dead. Maybe the frenzy of what Christmas has become had already choked it to death . . . slowly . . . year by frenzied year. And maybe it is choking us, too.
Jesus once said, “Be on your guard against all kinds of greed.” I wonder if he even imagined that some day the celebration of his own birth would become known for its own kind of greed. This Christmas let’s all be on our guard against Christmas greed—it seems to be a fatal condition.
If you’d like to consider some alternatives to a materialistic Christmas, here are a couple of websites that you may find helpful:
http://www.adventconspiracy.org/
http://www.redefine-christmas.org/
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment