Take "Keep Christ in Christmas" as an example.
I first encountered it when I was in grade school in Powers. I was maybe six or seven.
It was a reaction to what was seen as a new contraction of "Christmas" to "Xmas." Some people are always on the lookout for anything that will offend them. What H.L. Mencken referred to as "puritanism" -- "The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." And most often the offense taken has little basis in reality.
You see, some of the congregants in our little Open Bible church believed that atheists (most likely egged on by vegetarians and Alger Hiss) were so offended by the word "Christ" (the Greek word for "Messiah") that they wanted to X him out of our lives.
It turns out the fear was horribly misplaced. "Xmas" is actually sacred, not blasphemous. The "X" represents the Greek letter "chi" -- the first letter in "Christ" in Greek -- and has been used for centuries as a symbol for Christianity. Similar to those aluminum fish adorning the fenders of American Hondas.
I thought of that cultural storm in a teapot during my Thanksgiving visit to Bend. In the Costco parking lot, I saw a little blue Kia with a "Keep Christ in Christmas" bumper sticker. Complete with a manger and a star shining above it.
I shook my head. Not because of the "Xmas" dispute of my youth, but because keeping Christ confined to Christmas is exactly one of the maladies of modern Christianity in America.
Let me explain. One of the funnier scenes in Talledega Nights is Ricky Bobby's insistence to offer grace by asking the Baby Jesus to answer his prayers.
But that is exactly what a lot of us Christians do. We like the image of the baby in the manager. We might even be impressed that through his son, the world can be reconciled with God. But we often just leave that baby in there in the straw. At least, in our actions.
There is something comforting that we can sing carols about that helpless little baby. He will coo and cry, but baby Jesus makes no demands on us. As adults, we are the ones in charge.
No bothersome requests for us to love God with all your being, and our neighbor as ourselves. Or to feed the hungry. To give drink to the thirsty. To welcome strangers. To clothe the naked. To visit the sick and those in prison.
That was the adult Jesus who exhorted us to act in ways that would show our love to one another -- just as God has shown his love to us. And had he stayed in that manger, had Christ been nothing more than a Christmas story, we would not now have the light he has given us.
So, on this Christmas morning, that is my suggestion. Let's get away from the manger and start sharing that grace we have been given. It does not need to be showy. In fact, it should not be showy. True grace to our fellow humans should be as natural as the darkness it seeks to replace.
And that does not apply to only my fellow Christians. The life lessons Jesus taught are available to all. And the world would be a far better place if we simply tried a lot harder to appeal to the better side of our nature.
To you and your families, I offer shalom and salam.
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