EDINBURGH, Scotland, December 24, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) — This Christmas will be the strangest ever for millions of Christians across the western world. We are going to have to check the headlines to see what our governments want us to do, and then we are going to do what we believe God is calling us to do: at least, I hope so. We’re just going to do it while looking over our shoulder, and that’s an uncomfortable thought.
But it occurred to me that the first Christmas was also uncomfortable, and the discomfort was also caused by government fiat. We read in the Gospel of Luke that a “decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered.” For this reason, Joseph and his betrothed Mary went from Nazareth to Bethlehem, Joseph’s ancestral town, 90 miles away. They had to go uphill and downhill, and put up with rainy days and cold nights, and bump along on donkeys when they were too tired to walk. Perhaps they joined a caravan of other travellers for protection against wild animals and brigands.
Then, of course, when Mary and Joseph got to Bethlehem, there was no room in an inn, and so Baby Jesus was born in a stable, like an animal, and put in a feeding trough, like food. (Speaking of that famous manger, a better foreshadowing of Holy Communion cannot be imagined. This is underscored by the fact that Bethlehem is Hebrew for “House of Bread.”) However picturesque, the journey must have been very uncomfortable, and a pain in the neck, and did not follow an ideal birthing plan from a human point of view.
That said, there’s no doubt that Jesus’s birth in the straw was God’s will. After all, the prophet Micah had foretold around 700 years before that the Redeemer would be born in Bethlehem. Scripture does not say if Micah knew this would come about through Rome’s taxation protocols. However, it does stress how accepting both Mary and Joseph were of God’s will. I cannot imagine them complaining about the weather, the journey, or the stable. Can you?
There’s a lesson there, I imagine, in how to have the merriest Christmas possible despite the cruelty and incompetence of governors who would rather “cancel Christmas” than admit they’ve made catastrophic mistakes. After all, the immediate human cause of Baby Jesus being born in Bethlehem was unjust governors and their tax regime. Mary and Joseph did not delay obeying the Roman Empire’s command to register in Bethlehem until after the Baby was born: presumably they discerned that God, too, wanted them there right then. They were happy to go because, being our greatest saints, their wills were perfectly aligned with God’s will.
What is God’s will for your Christmas? Is it a slavish adherence to government protocols? I haven’t discerned this for myself, although as a nurse or someone else who works with very elderly or infirm people, you may discern that God is calling you to that. Is it opening your house to all friends, family and neighbours, regardless of health or age, who would sincerely rather die than be alone on Christmas Day? That only you can say, having sought the answer in prayer.
Having discerned God’s will for this strange Christmas, there are ways to ease the involuntary break from your usual traditions. Having spent the first 10 Christmases of my married life far from home, I can tell you that making your traditional Christmas dishes (or at least two of them) is a great way to summon the Ghost of happy Christmases Past. It is also consoling to learn to make a Christmas dish of particular importance to a guest who is himself or herself far from home. Cleaning and decorating your home (or wherever you find yourself over Christmas) to the best of your ability is also cheering. Arranging Christmastide Skype or Zoom dates is now an annual tradition for me. My entire family has been together for Christmas only once since my niece was born.
That was last year, and thank goodness we all managed the logistics to make it happen. Thank goodness my husband was well enough to travel to Canada, and thank goodness we had enough money both for the eyewatering Christmas airfares and for presents. Since the COVID lockdowns began, we have been expressing our gratitude that we had such a wonderful Christmas in 2019 and that no nasty surprise arrived to mar it. Everything worked out, even our cold cab ride from Midnight Mass to my parents’ house.
This Christmas will be a little colder, humanly speaking, although it will be an opportunity to reflect on the cold, the dark, and perhaps the initial loneliness just before the Nativity. And I expect we will all do our best to have the merriest Christmas possible under the circumstances, with friends striving to substitute for faraway family, and friendly policemen suddenly unable to count heads in a car or around the Christmas table.