In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Every year at Christmas the television and the print media are filled with stories trying to get at the “truth” of the Christmas story. They address topics like “the historical Jesus”, and they try to scrape away the centuries of pious mythology, to salvage the nuggets of whatever might be empirically or historically verifiable from the elaborately mythologized Gospel narratives. There are whole cottage industries devoted to this scraping and pruning of the narratives, and most Biblical scholars at prominent universities and seminaries are hired precisely because they have demonstrated themselves to be adept wielders of the pruning hook of scientific standards and empirical benchmarks.
But that is not what Christmas is about. Several nights ago, in a moment of acute romanticism, I purchased “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and watched it. It’s a wonderful little cartoon, and I highly recommend it. It recounts Charlie Brown’s frustration with the commercialism and abstraction into which the celebration of Christmas has descended in Western culture. This, indeed, is the perennial concern of many of us, particularly those of us who are prone to sentimentalism. Charlie Brown goes around looking for the true meaning of Christmas, and he’s frustrated at every turn. Finally in a moment of exasperation, he cries out “Isn’t there anybody who can tell me what Christmas is all about?” And then Linus says very quietly and straightforwardly: “I can tell you what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.” Linus asks for lights and a microphone, and he proceeds to read the Gospel lesson from this mass:
And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. (And this taxing was first made when Cyre'ni-us was governor of Syria.) And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, (because he was of the house and lineage of David,) to be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child. And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them; and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
And Linus concludes: “That is what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.”
We are not here to remember something that can be placed under a microscope or laid-bear before the critical scrutiny of the unimaginative. We are here to commemorate and to re-enact a myth, something that was and is and will always be totally and completely impossible. It is somehow fitting that Linus, an unreal, one dimensional, cartoon character, should be the one to remind us of what is most real and most true. For virgins do not conceive. Almighty God, whom the whole world cannot contain, is not laid in a manger. God does not grow up. God is certainly not nailed to a tree. And dead men do not live again. It is IMPOSSIBLE …Yet this is our teaching. This is our faith. This is the TRUTH. We believe and confess what is “most impossible”.
[Cf. Angelus Silesius:
"The most impossible is possible
With your arrow you cannot reach the sun,
With mine I can sweep under my fire the eternal sun.”]
The great Anglican lay-poet W.H. Auden saw the great impossibility of salvation, and he wrote a poem about it called “For the Time Being” –
Alone, alone, about a dreadful wood
Of conscious evil runs a lost mankind,
Dreading to find its Father lest it find
The Goodness it has dreaded is not good:
Alone, alone, about our dreadful wood.
Where is that Law for which we broke our own,
Where now that Justice for which Flesh resigned
Her hereditary right to passion, Mind
His will to absolute power? Gone. Gone.
Where is that Law for which we broke our own?
The Pilgrim Way has led to the Abyss.
Was it to meet such grinning evidence
We left our richly odoured ignorance?
Was the triumphant answer to be this?
The Pilgrim Way has led to the Abyss.
We who must die demand a miracle.
How could the Eternal do a temporal act,
The Infinite become a finite fact?
Nothing can save us that is possible:
We who must die demand a miracle.
We, who must die, do not seek what is possible; for what is possible is telluric, “of the earth” – it is mundane, and it cannot save us. We who must die demand a MIRACLE. We DEMAND the impossible. Why? Because we want to be SAVED, and salvation is not possible.
But we believe and confess that the impossible is nevertheless ACTUAL. Virgins do not conceive. And yet a Virgin conceived. God Almighty is totally beyond our ken, out of reach; we are cut off from Heaven. Yet the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth – and we beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.
That is the MIRACLE of Christmas – the miracle of our Christian faith – the impossibility of the ACTUAL in the narrative of salvation (for with God, NOTHING will be impossible): “to YOU is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Every year at Christmas the television and the print media are filled with stories trying to get at the “truth” of the Christmas story. They address topics like “the historical Jesus”, and they try to scrape away the centuries of pious mythology, to salvage the nuggets of whatever might be empirically or historically verifiable from the elaborately mythologized Gospel narratives. There are whole cottage industries devoted to this scraping and pruning of the narratives, and most Biblical scholars at prominent universities and seminaries are hired precisely because they have demonstrated themselves to be adept wielders of the pruning hook of scientific standards and empirical benchmarks.
But that is not what Christmas is about. Several nights ago, in a moment of acute romanticism, I purchased “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and watched it. It’s a wonderful little cartoon, and I highly recommend it. It recounts Charlie Brown’s frustration with the commercialism and abstraction into which the celebration of Christmas has descended in Western culture. This, indeed, is the perennial concern of many of us, particularly those of us who are prone to sentimentalism. Charlie Brown goes around looking for the true meaning of Christmas, and he’s frustrated at every turn. Finally in a moment of exasperation, he cries out “Isn’t there anybody who can tell me what Christmas is all about?” And then Linus says very quietly and straightforwardly: “I can tell you what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.” Linus asks for lights and a microphone, and he proceeds to read the Gospel lesson from this mass:
And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. (And this taxing was first made when Cyre'ni-us was governor of Syria.) And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, (because he was of the house and lineage of David,) to be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child. And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn. And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them; and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
And Linus concludes: “That is what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.”
We are not here to remember something that can be placed under a microscope or laid-bear before the critical scrutiny of the unimaginative. We are here to commemorate and to re-enact a myth, something that was and is and will always be totally and completely impossible. It is somehow fitting that Linus, an unreal, one dimensional, cartoon character, should be the one to remind us of what is most real and most true. For virgins do not conceive. Almighty God, whom the whole world cannot contain, is not laid in a manger. God does not grow up. God is certainly not nailed to a tree. And dead men do not live again. It is IMPOSSIBLE …Yet this is our teaching. This is our faith. This is the TRUTH. We believe and confess what is “most impossible”.
[Cf. Angelus Silesius:
"The most impossible is possible
With your arrow you cannot reach the sun,
With mine I can sweep under my fire the eternal sun.”]
The great Anglican lay-poet W.H. Auden saw the great impossibility of salvation, and he wrote a poem about it called “For the Time Being” –
Alone, alone, about a dreadful wood
Of conscious evil runs a lost mankind,
Dreading to find its Father lest it find
The Goodness it has dreaded is not good:
Alone, alone, about our dreadful wood.
Where is that Law for which we broke our own,
Where now that Justice for which Flesh resigned
Her hereditary right to passion, Mind
His will to absolute power? Gone. Gone.
Where is that Law for which we broke our own?
The Pilgrim Way has led to the Abyss.
Was it to meet such grinning evidence
We left our richly odoured ignorance?
Was the triumphant answer to be this?
The Pilgrim Way has led to the Abyss.
We who must die demand a miracle.
How could the Eternal do a temporal act,
The Infinite become a finite fact?
Nothing can save us that is possible:
We who must die demand a miracle.
We, who must die, do not seek what is possible; for what is possible is telluric, “of the earth” – it is mundane, and it cannot save us. We who must die demand a MIRACLE. We DEMAND the impossible. Why? Because we want to be SAVED, and salvation is not possible.
But we believe and confess that the impossible is nevertheless ACTUAL. Virgins do not conceive. And yet a Virgin conceived. God Almighty is totally beyond our ken, out of reach; we are cut off from Heaven. Yet the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth – and we beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father.
That is the MIRACLE of Christmas – the miracle of our Christian faith – the impossibility of the ACTUAL in the narrative of salvation (for with God, NOTHING will be impossible): “to YOU is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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