Reflections

Listening to christmas carols sung by Kathleen Battle, and contemplating.......

We are a very secular household, mistrustful of organized religion for the ill it has brought to the world, and the ill it still brings to the world. The wars, the nauseting way political figures in this country thumb their bibles, and sell out their souls for power, the use of religion for justification of some many stupid and injustice things.....

and yet....listening to this very religious music, this very spiritual music, floods me with a sense of hope, love, and the grand possibilties of humanity when we open our hearts to the ideals imbodied in the Christmas story itself.

Afterall it is the story of one small family's journey through an unjust world. The love of family prevailing over this injustice, with the help of strangers: the inkeeper who finds shelter for the expectant mother as her time draws near, the sheperds who come to celebrate the child's birth, the maji who bring gifts. Those who one might imagine help shelter the baby from Herod's madness.

It is also about the special possibility and hope that babies bring to world. That the baby born in poverty can grow up to be one who changes the world.

It is about a mother and father's love for their child, the waiting for the baby to be born which is a magical and transforming time for anyone who goes through it.

It is about birth and life and love, and the cycle that envelopes us all and connects us to one another.

The problem for me is how to convey these feelings about humanity and its capacity for goodness into our holiday celebration.