Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve - Year C

Luke 2:1-20
Isaiah 9:2-7
Psalm 96
Titus 2:11-14

It doesn't matter if there was actually a census or not. An intent to register in order to dominate is sufficient. This was the state of the world - regimented. Was?

Into this legalization comes a child (coming through its mother's line - read Sarah the Priestess: The First Matriarch of Genesis by Savina Teubal and extrapolate from there) a-lying in a manger. This swaddled child of a matriarch is a sign of a new way of doing business. From this generalized description of a child and a manger there is heard a far off hymn of new creation come close enough to make out the words, "Glory . . . Peace." [Luke]

Of course our tendency is to take this antiestablishmentarianism of a manger child capable of throwing a wrench into the gears of registrations and to turn it into the opposite of what we have experienced. Hooray, I get to be in charge. And, of course, that will bring with it grand titles and an assumption of knowing what is just and righteous. How many times has that turned sour on us. [Isaiah]

If we don't take that direct approach to overthrowing the regimenters, we sit back and sing a song of an active God - great and greatly to be praised. It won't be long before the pie in the sky sets everything right and treats everyone fairly. Keep singing those carols. [Psalm]

And didn't you just know the catch to all this is blood atonement. G*D's readiness to give and forgive demands sacrifice. A simple baby in a manger must become God and Savior and dead before being effective. [Titus]

Perhaps we simply need to go back to a baby, any baby. It is urge to birth that brings the light back, a return of complex justice, a continually new song, and giving and forgiving. Look behind an aborted, a stillborn, a genetically compromised, a socially untenable, a healthy birth - any - each is a sign to us in the darkness - fecundity pushes onward. Now we can even claim our birth and the weird way our journey has been woven as a sign in the darkness. May we release the Glory within to become the Peace around and about.

The angels have returned from whence they came, leaving you and me, baby signs. Ready, set, go! [Wesley]