In our Northern Hemisphere, the Winter Solstice has marked both the nadir of the year’s light and the beginning of its return.  Hope (we hope) is dawning on the horizon – most obviously in the advent of vaccines that can stem the devastation of the pandemic and perhaps will bring a shift in other personal and global concerns as well.  There is something elemental about the energies and rhythms of the natural world that reminds us how deeply connected we still are despite how “civilized” we have become.   It is a wonder, indeed, but no surprise that so many cultures and traditions have developed rituals and festivals to mark this time of year.

Here is a short reflection from a Christian perspective for the season.  You might want to first read the story of the birth of Jesus from the second chapter of The Gospel of Luke, or you might know it by heart: “In those days, there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.”  And so it continues and is echoed in what follows.  Maybe – as I do as I write – you will listen to some of your favorite seasonal music as you read.

 

Away in a manger no crib for a bed,

the little lord Jesus laid down his sweet head.

The stars in the bright sky looked down where he lay,

the little lord Jesus asleep on the hay.

(Voices United, #69)

 

There was no room at the inn, Luke’s sometimes harsh and always strange story tells us, so the young couple from Nazareth finds refuge instead in a rustic stable somewhere nearby.  Is this a simple fact amid the press of other travelers arriving in a rather small town for the census imposed by the Emperor?  Or is it the writer’s way of suggesting something more primal – a deep-seated hostility towards the holiness embodied in the vulnerable little one born there or even towards the One who sent him?  No room in our lives for Spirit, perhaps, in the busyness and preoccupations of life, in the bitter aftertaste left by the unfairness and pain this life may have visited upon us, in our disillusionment with the institutional packaging of Spirit…?  Simple observation affirms that many folks seem to be going about their business with little attention to the mystery at the heart of life – whether in passive indifference, active rejection, or from a motivation more twisted and sinister. Yet my conviction (some might call it my naiveté) is that – pushed aside or buried deep as it may be – our hunger for an authentic ground of meaning, purpose, and belonging in our lives is never completely extinguished.  Perhaps the apparent apathy or hostility towards Spirit that we observe is that very hunger thwarted and diverted into other channels.  Currents of air may cause one lone candle to flicker in the surrounding darkness but it steadfastly remains alit.

So I invite you to imagine with me what it might be like if there was room at the inn.  What are we be making room for because, deep down, there is room at our inn for such a birth?

Room for wonder, perhaps. In a night without artificial light to dim the pin-point clarity of each star in a sky full of stars within swirling galaxies stretching even farther than our imaginations can stretch.  In the whisper of angel-song around the shepherds awakening us to something beyond the limits of our usual senses. In a breathtaking moment of remembering that the Holy dwells not just in one special person but in all persons, in all living things, in all matter, in you and in me.  Wonder.

Room for compassion, perhaps – the very thing so obviously missing in the story. The choice to welcome in not turn away when there is need and desperation knocking.  A generosity of spirit that offers gifts not just to our own dear ones but extends to acts of charity and justice-making in a world beset with need and desperation.  A recognition of the humanity in the Other that moves us from erecting walls to installing gates and, on a more personal level, that shifts us from resentment to forgiveness.  That welcomes back the little hurting child still hiding somewhere inside our world-worn exterior. Compassion.

Room for salvation, perhaps.  Not just in the narrow sense favored by some but in its fuller and more essential meaning as healing and wholeness.  For each of us, our deep hunger for meaning, purpose, and belonging – for love – finally satisfied.  For our long-suffering world to experience what the angel-song promised: peace on earth and goodwill to all.  Salvation.

 

You, Love, have established yourself in secret places,

seeking out receptive hearts,

ready to enter and make your dwelling place within.

(from Psalm 9, Nan Merrill, “Psalms for Praying”, Continuum Publishing, 2002)

May our hearts be receptive and spacious this Christmas and always – with ample room for wonder, compassion, and salvation.

 

For further reflection:

1. Why do you think some folks seem oblivious or even hostile to Spirit?
2. How can we sensitively and respectfully encourage folks to reconsider the possibility of Spirit?
3. Besides my suggestions of wonder, compassion, and salvation, what else might a hospitable heart welcome in?
4. To what would you attribute your own ground for meaning, purpose, and belonging in life?
5. What do you yearn for with the renewal of light – for yourself, for those in your close circle, for our world?

 

A candle is burning, a flame warm and bright,

a candle of hope in December’s dark night.

While angels sing blessings from heaven’s starry sky,

our hearts we prepare now, for Jesus is nigh.

(Voices United, #6)

Blessing and peace to you,

this day and each day,

this season and all seasons.

Ted