Inedible Ink

After silent night comes the dawn of redeeming grace.  The child asleep in Mary’s lap is the redeemer.
Merry Christmas all!

The child whose birth we celebrate at Christmas was Mary’s boy, Jesus.

I won’t suggest here and now that you need to give Mary any more honor than you currently do, but I do ask, Do you sing about her at Christmas?

I would think that singing about Mary at Christmastime would make at least as much sense as singing of shepherds, magi, the tree, weather, and King Wenceslas, no matter how good a king he was.

Keep score at your Church service: Do the hymns and carols that are sung refer to Mary as often as the scripture verses that are read? My money’s on the Scriptures. If the hymns come up short, consider why that might be.

FIRST THINGS: Blog Archive Looking for Mary in Christmas Carols

Yeah, part eleven. Did I ever say I was doing them in order?

It is “Common Knowledge” that Christmas is just a Churchy ploy to co-opt a pre-existing pagan feast. It’s just one more instance of The Man coming down on The People and oppressing their True Spirituality.

Isn’t it?

Where did that idea come from? It is so prevalent, at least the pagan feast part, that it is practically taken for granted. The notion has been accepted at face value for 150 years.
What evidence do we have of the “Stolen pagan feast” idea? What evidence would we require to accept December 25th as the Christ child’s real birthday? Are our requirements for proof fair, or do we grant the benefit of the doubt to paganism?

Here’s one thought: ‘Pagan’ means little more than not Christian, Jewish or Muslim. Some take it to infer polytheism, but in any case it is not a technical term. Which pagan group, exactly, had their feast stolen? Was it the Roman cult of Saturn worshippers? Probably not, they had no doings on the 25th of December. Was it Egyptians worshipping a Sun goddess? Solstices would be important there, but what feast was stolen, and were you ready to claim that this theft occurred in Egypt?

building your own personal Stonehenge.

If the claim is that early Roman Christians stole a feast day, the stolen feast would need to exist not only before Christian celebrations of Christ’s Birthday on the 25th of December but also before Christian observations of The Annunciation on March 25th exactly 9 months prior.

Read more: Calculating Christmas

When we try to understand what we’re preparing for during Advent, when we ask ourselves this question “What Child is this?”, when we sing the songs of the Christmas season, one word keeps coming up: “Angel”

Angels appear to Daniel in a vision Dan 9:21, to Zacharias in the temple Luk 1:19, to Mary at the Annunciation Luk 1:26, to Joseph in a dream Mat 1:20, to the shepherds tending their flocks Luk 2:8, and to Joseph again sending the Holy family to Egypt Mat 2:13. Angels, angels, angels, angels, angels.

I saw a box of Christmas cards on display yesterday that made me want to return to the subject of angels. The image was of an angel on a cloud, and as the Home Depot selection went it was one of the least secular, most “Christian” of the available cards. However, this portrayal of the angel revealed a sad underestimation by this artist of angels. This angel was a doe-eyed, pouty-lipped, airbrushed, winged blonde who looked like she had just finished a senior portrait photoshoot at the Glamour Shots Studio down at the mall.

She looked very earthly, fully corporeal and, actually, she looked kinda sexy.

I have never seen an angel, but I don’t expect angels look very much like teenage girls. Artists taking angels more seriously through the ages have been stuck doing their best renderings of these supernatural creatures with earthly symbols as approximations. Trumpet blasts, blinding beams of light, fine asexual facial features, and yes, wings are some of the clues we’re given to try to understand angels.

I think these symbols make sense as a visual shorthand for supernatural, flying messengers of God who are overwhelming to look upon. But how can a painter do better justice to the vision which made the prophet Daniel faint?

A stand-up comic says: “You can’t make this stuff up.”

By this the comic means that the funny story he’s telling must be true, because no one in their right mind would’ve fabricated such a thing.

The Gospels tell a story of God, become man, conceived in the womb of the virgin Mary.

If you were going to fabricate the story of a god out of your own imaginings, would you include a part where he’s an unborn baby totally vulnerable but for the protection of a teenage girl? Would you think to write the chapter of painful, humiliating, self-sacrifice of scourging and death on the cross?

If your job was to illustrate an all-powerful being, would you begin your story with the utterly helpless form of a human infant lying in the livestock’s feed trough?

Jennifer Roback Morse on Christmas on National Review Online
Many gods obviously have been created by man. The gods of the Greeks, for instance, get jealous, commit adultery, fight among themselves, kill humans, take revenge, and occasionally fall in love. Very human characters who happen to be immortal and have superhuman powers. It’s easy to believe people invented these gods.But the god of Christianity is something different altogether. Christians believe God is love. They hold that God is a communion of three persons: the one who loves, the one who receives love, and the love itself. That union is so intense that it is One God, just as the Hebrews had already insisted. What other religion has ever invented such a god?

Christians believe that in the fullness of time, God, the one who loves, sent His only Son, whom he loves, to live on earth among human beings. And God did not choose to flaunt his power over his creatures, nor did He demand adulation. Instead, He humbled Himself and allowed Himself to take on the most vulnerable and dependent form. Christians believe that the Holy Spirit, Love Itself, came upon a humble girl from Nazareth, and that “the Power of the Most High overshadowed” her. The creator of the universe allowed himself to be formed within a woman’s womb, carried for nine months, and then born as a helpless child to impoverished parents, weary from travel, who had only a stable for shelter.

Who ever heard of a god doing something like that?

I got a version of this essay in my email the other day. I like it, and I was glad to find a source for the original for you to read.  The title links to the complete essay:

Ben’s House - Stuff Ben Wrote
I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don’t feel threatened. I don’t feel discriminated against. That’s what they are: Christmas trees. It doesn’t bother me a bit when people say, “Merry Christmas” to me. I don’t think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it.

Merry Christmas, Ben, Le’Chaim!

I saw this bumper sticker last week, it seems appropriate. (I’ve linked the image to someone selling the sticker in case you’re feeling especially cynical.)

“Jesus is coming! LOOK BUSY”

“Advent” is a word that means the coming of something important. The Jews were waiting for something important in the Christ child just as Christians today are waiting for something important in the second coming.
The Liturgical season of Advent began yesterday. For the first Sunday in Advent the Church presents a not-very-Christmassy Gospel. From Matthew 24 it is a part of Christ’s answer to a question from the disciples asking about the end of the world:

Matt 24, 3: Tell us, when shall these things be? and what [shall be] the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?

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Matt 24,37-44: But as the days of Noe [were], so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

What Child, then? The one who is to come again at the end of time.

Look busy, indeed.

Previously in the “What Child is this? series: #12 is here.

Pope Benedict XVI getting in on the “What Child is This?” action:

Catholic World News : Spread Christmas joy and awe, Pope challenges children
Vatican, Dec. 21, 2006 (CWNews.com) - “The birth of Jesus is not a fable,” Pope Benedict XVI (bio - news) reminded a group of children gathered at the Vatican on December 21 to give him their Christmas greetings.

This Child we ask about in the song is not a fable.

“How can this be?”

Luke’s Gospel tells of two births, each one foretold by an angel. Both Zacharias and Mary, in their turn respond to the angel’s news each with their own version of “How can this be?, Because…”
A deacon instructed me to read these replies-to-an-angel and try to hear the speaker’s tone of voice. There must have been a significant difference between Zacharias’ tone and Mary’s because of the difference in outcomes:

Zacharias says in Luke 1:18:

And Zacharias said unto the angel, Whereby shall I know this? for I am an old man, and my wife well stricken in years.

Zacharias’ results in Luke 1:20:

And, behold, thou shalt be dumb, and not able to speak, until the day that these things shall be performed, because thou believest not my words, which shall be fulfilled in their season.

What did Zacharias sound like? Was there doubt in his voice? His reply sounds reasonable enough, but Gabriel rebukes him saying: (19)“I am Gabriel, that stand in the presence of God; and am sent to speak unto thee, and to shew thee these glad tidings.” He sounds a little irritated, doesn’t he? Like a father administering discipline he reminds Zacharias of his position, “…because I’m your father, and this is my house, and since you don’t seem to believe me, I’m taking away your cell phone for nine months, maybe after nine months you’ll believe.”

Mary says in Luke 1:34:

Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?

Mary’s results in Luke 1:20:

For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.

What did Mary sound like? She does ask “How?” but the angel does not rebuke her and remind her of his position and power, he explains himself:

(35)The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.

Mary must been very courageous to question an angel at all, don’t you think? This one particular question must have been very important to her to get her to speak up. She’s just been given news that would turn her life completely upside down, she must’ve had alot on her mind, her parents, a new baby to worry about. Of everything she now has to think about, the one issue pressing enough to ask the angel about is her virginity.

Mary does not presume that this child will come the natural way even though she’s already espoused to Joseph. If an ordinary woman, already promised in ordinary marriage to a man, was told by an angel that she would conceive a child would she not reasonably presume the natural course of events that lead to conception?

The angel tells that the child will hold the throne of David and reign over the house of Jacob. Joseph is of the House of David, yet Mary does not presume that the child is to be Joseph’s. She is certain enough that the baby is not to be the result of a natural union with Joseph that she uses her one question on this concern.

How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?

With thanks to: A Slice of Infinity: Questioning Gabriel, by Jill Carattini

The What child is this? series for the Advent season resumes. The series was called edifying just the other day, even though the most recent installment is nearly a year old. I’ll try to live up to that kindness without letting much of it go to my head.

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What Child is This? This child was born in Bethlehem, from bêth lehem, meaning “house of bread” (source: New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia) and was laid in a manger, a trough from which livestock eat grain.

Luke 2:7 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.

The word “manger” isn’t one we use outside the Christmas season. We call the little bed in the Nativity scene a “manger” but if anything eats out of it, we’ll call it a “trough”. To Luke, it is one thing as in ~and laid him in a feedtrough~ perhaps.
I, for one, don’t speak a word of Hebrew, the “house of bread” meaning of “Bethlehem” is to me a well-hidden clue. To Luke, it might have been as plain as the nose on your face. Had the miraculous birth occurred in the modern U.S. and been written of in American English, I have to think that He would have been born in “Bakerstown, Nebraska” and laid in a bread basket, or even, upon a cutting board, for the meaning to come through as clearly.

John 6:35 And Jesus said to them: I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall not hunger: and he that believeth in me shall never thirst.

John 6:51,52 I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that I will give, is my flesh, for the life of the world.

What Child is This born in Bethlehem and laid in a manger? The Bread of Life, The Living Bread, the edible savior.