A Christmas lament

Published in the Sunday Island newspaper, Sri Lanka, in December 2011

As material prosperity rolls across the globe like a tsunami, Christendom (at least in the West) has taken Jesus out of Christmas and installed the Golden Calf in His place.

The values that Jesus came to embody in human beings are cynically ignored while material wealth and manic egoism have become the ultimate good. To be rich, or to be a celebrity, and to stay in the public eye somehow, is now the highest end of life. Greed, the hunger for material goods, the unquenchable thirst for public acclaim, and the incessant pursuit of worldly success, have taken precedence over truth, humility, righteousness, love, peace, etc, etc, values which more than any others should define what it means to be Christian.

To be truthful, however, except during the first 100 years after the Resurrection, far from embodying the values espoused by Jesus of Nazareth, Western Christendom espoused acquisitiveness, greed, pillage, exploitation, violence and war, more than it did the opposite virtues. Any serious history of the world will confirm this.

During the "season", as I watch TV at home or walk down any high street, I am constantly assailed by a relentless barrage of messages, most of it encouraging greed, accumulation, over-consumption and materiality. Because of these grotesque manifestations, the onset of Christmas, far from evoking in me feelings of joy and peace, provokes a profound inner disquiet and stomach-turning feelings of “aaaargh!”

Lest any Christians should feel offended, let me say at the very outset that I consider my allegiance to Jesus Christ to transcend every other loyalty, whether to tradition, to church, to state, to culture or society, and even to my family and that I write this piece primarily out of a desire to protect and exalt His name rather than to denigrate it.

I am writing this also in the hope that I will be able to persuade Christians, even in an infinitesimal degree, to cease from desecrating His name during the “season”, while claiming to celebrate it.

Two reasons prompt me to say that, for me, the 25th of December and the days leading up to it, is a time of sadness and extreme disquiet.

The lie

The first reason is that there is not a shred of evidence, either in the Bible or in any Hebrew, Greek or Roman historical records that the man named Jesus was born on the 25th of December. To the contrary, to any unbiased student of the New Testament it should be clear that Jesus could not have been born on the 25th of December. The evidence is overwhelming.

To that extent, as it has been understood and celebrated among Christians for over 1700 years (the first recorded celebration of 25th December was in 336 AD), Christmas has been a lie and a charade.

Biblical scholars of all theological schools claim that it was only as late as 350 AD that the 25th of December came to be officially proclaimed by the Church to be the date of Jesus Christ’s birth, without having had any evidence to support it.

Furthermore, they also agree that the fixing of December the 25th as the day of the Nativity was a concession to pagan cults which were dominant in Rome around the 3rd century AD.

They claim that the 25th of December was chosen around 350 AD as the date for the Nativity by Pope Julius 1st in order to coincide with the pagan cult of Saturnalia which fell on the 21st of December, thereby hoping to wean its followers away from the worship of Saturn to the worship of Jesus Christ. Some other scholars, while agreeing that Christmas is essentially a pagan celebration, also claim that it originated in Rome around the 4th century by co-opting the worship of the Iranian pagan deity Mithras, which had penetrated Roman culture about two centuries earlier.

In either case there is total unanimity amongst scholars that there is neither Biblical nor secular historical evidence to warrant the choice of December the 25th as the date of the Nativity.

Hence my claim that Christmas, as it has been perpetuated by churches and observed for centuries within Christendom on the 25th of December, has been mostly a lie and a charade.

Tradition!

The natural question to ask is how and why a blatant lie could have been perpetuated for over 1700 years? The simple answer is "tradition".

I fully accept the value of tradition for transmitting truth but, unbeknown to us, over time, blatant lies, superstitions and compromises get embedded in sacred traditions and pass for truth. Therefore, however long established they may be, traditions must continuously be subjected to the ultimate test, which is the acid test of truth. Should any tradition be found wanting when subjected to that test, especially if it is blatantly in denial of it, it must be abandoned!

A tradition does not validate itself merely by the length of time over which it has survived. If it did, we should accept and celebrate the oldest tradition there is upon planet earth, which is the tradition of SIN! However, we reject the tradition of sin because it conflicts with truth!

So then, truth is the ultimate arbiter and not the tradition itself, and any tradition that does not stand the test of truth must be rejected, such as the claim that Jesus was born on the 25th of December. Not to do so is to collude with the father of all lies - the Devil.

Jesus said, "You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free" (John 8:32) – i.e. free from bondage to all traditions and rules that are in conflict with truth.

Jesus also asked, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?” (Matt. 15:3, NIV).

Jesus also reminds us "You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions” (Mark 7:8, NIV).

Jesus' unequivocal rejection of man-made traditions which conflict with truth is absolutely clear.

Religious traditions are like rivers in spate, delivering not only life-giving water to those living downstream, but a lot of toxic substances as well. Therefore, we should be wary about conforming to traditions merely because they have been handed down to us even over centuries. Traditions must continuously be tested against truth for toxic accretions, and we must not accept traditions which violate truth, any more than we should drink unfiltered water from a river in spate.

An abomination

The second reason for my disquiet over the Christmas season is that under the guise of celebrating His birth, some Christians are lapsing into paganism, thereby reducing the event to an abomination. They stuff themselves to satiation with food and drink, they spend money which can be shared with the poor on giving gifts to each other, which none of them really need and which merely add to domestic clutter and environmental pollution. They cut swathes through forests for producing billions of Christmas cards, for wrapping unwanted gifts and for putting up pagan Christmas trees, and they wallow in the mush of materialism which is the polar opposite of the culture that Jesus Christ lived out on earth.

Statistics show, at least in the West, that the period immediately following Christmas is marked by a sharp rise in the divorce rate, in visits to psychiatrists’ clinics and in mental breakdowns. Accident and emergency services in hospitals are stretched to capacity, having to cope with increased drunk-driving accidents, and to treat illnesses brought on through gluttony and excessive consumption of alcohol. Police stations have to put their full strength on standby for coping with drunken brawls and increased break-ins and burglaries. Not least, Christmas is also a time for sharply escalating domestic debt.

The only real beneficiaries of these orgies are the commercial houses, especially pubs, taverns and liquor shops. Over the Christmas season, throughout the world, except perhaps in Moslem countries, high street takings shoot up by 70% and the manufacturing sector earns more profits than at any other time in a given year. Worship of the Golden Calf is very much alive!

Christmas jollity

Many Christians look forward to Christmas for the mood of good cheer and the jollity it can bring. It can draw families and friends together in happy reunions and generally spreads goodwill around, even for a few short hours. It can perhaps give people a sense of release from the drudgery of the workplace and of daily life, and can provide them with an opportunity to relax, which is not a bad thing at all. To the contrary, this aspect can be hugely therapeutic, and I am all for it.

My problem is that none of this really has anything to do with the Christ! It is an inherently cultural or mundane activity, which in and of itself is entirely legitimate and blameless, but why invoke the name of the Christ to mask it?

The central question is whether, in the midst of all the traditional Christmas merrymaking, in the midst of our eating and drinking, do we spare a thought for Jesus Christ?

Whilst singing all those beautiful carols and performing those long-hallowed rituals in church, how many of us can honestly claim to be conscious of the Christ's presence around us, and feel rising within, an inexpressible awe and reverence for Him?

After performing the traditional Christmas routines of lighting candles, shaking hands, smiling with each other, and exchanging greetings, how many of us can truly claim that we have emptied our hearts of all that foetid baggage we have been carrying around for years, and to have admitted the Christ to fill the space?

How many of these Christmas routines are simply token gestures to tradition and how many actually express the overwhelming love and forgiveness of the Christ dwelling within us?

The good cheer, the merrymaking and glitter of Christmas traditions, can be just that, only tinsel and glitter, having no more substance than the baubles that adorn our Christmas trees. Far from expressing the Spirit of Christ, the observance of Christmas traditions often mask His absence.

At the close of the "season" how many of us can truly claim that we have been transformed by Christ's advent into our hearts during Christmas? Is our "Christmas joy" purely a transitory experience, dependent solely on outer things, rather than an enduring experience that is expressive of the inner Spirit?

Only we ourselves, individually, under the penetrating gaze of the Holy Spirit, can supply the answers to those questions.

Abrahamic cells

What I have written above pertains to the "culture" of Christmas rather than to individual Christians or individual homes. I am profoundly aware that, wedged in the interstices of Christendom, there are millions of homes where the coming of Jesus Christ is celebrated not amidst mayhem, drunkenness and gluttony, but in quietness and in peace, in prayer and in meditation. I call them Abrahamic cells. Just as thousands of years back Abraham and his people came out of a pagan world to serve as the channel for the Good News, it is out of these 21st century Abrahamic cells that the message must go forth again, that the Word has been made flesh and has made His dwelling place in our midst.

Although it is absolutely true that Jesus was incarnated on planet earth in a space-time dimension, to freeze Him in space and time, by trying to fix the date of His birth, is to lose sight of the fact that Jesus Christ is eternal and beyond space and time. That is probably why the Holy Spirit did not leave any evidence in the Bible of the actual date of His birth.

Indeed, it is not important that we know when Jesus Christ was born, or even where He was born, because unless He is born in our hearts and minds and embeds Himself in our consciousness, from where he can commence the awesome task of transforming us, and the society around us, into His image and likeness, nothing is served by identifying when and where He was born, except satisfying our curiosity.

Rediscovering the Christ

The Risen Christ is saying, “Behold I stand at the door and knock” (Rev. 3:20). The only way that we can celebrate His coming is by opening the doors of our hearts and minds and letting Him in. It will not do to leave Jesus Christ in church or hanging on a cross. After completing His awesome work on the cross, He is waiting to enter our hearts.

Jesus also said, "Abide in Me, and I in you" (John15:4). He cannot abide in us unless we first invite Him in! It is as simple as that! However, when He does come to us, the first thing He does is to incinerate all that is within us that is not of God, and that can be quite painful and traumatic.

It is only then, after He has finished the demolition work, that He can speak through us, act through us, and announce Himself to the world through us. He then adopts us into his Father's household, as His sons and daughters, so that we may serve Him as demonstration models, here on earth.

No amount of church-going will avail. Neither ritual nor ceremony, neither carols by candlelight nor busyness in church activities, neither piety nor conformity to rules, can ever substitute for having a personal experience of the Christ.

In fact, all the aforesaid pursuits can be only distractions from the central truth, which is that the Christ must first be born "in" us. The fallen Adam must be crucified and buried, and the Risen Christ must fill its place. Fallen Adam and the Christ cannot coexist, any more than night can coexist with day.

That is the true Advent and the true Christmas – the only Christmas I would want to celebrate; and that celebration does not have to be on any particular day in the calendar, nor would it require turkey, gammon or wine.

For me, in proportion as I abide in Him and let Him abide in me, every day in the year is Christmas, and the joy that He imparts is unhindered by time or circumstance.