Christmas. Holidays. Yuletide. Chanukah. Oh, the merry, blessed, happy, wonderful, fabulous, memorable, busy, crazy, sad, lonely, bitter, hungry, overwhelming, often overhyped time of year that so many folk around the world anticipate.
I gathered with a group of women last week for our annual Christmas Tea and Ornament swap. It has become a bit of a tradition for me and I enjoyed it immensely. Part of our time together was spent sharing our family Christmas traditions. What a delight it was listening to stories of light and love and laughter, food and drink and giving.
In the days following this gathering, I was struck by another tradition that has become part of our culture; the annual online debate of calling this time of year “Christmas” vs. “The Holidays.” This post is not about which of these is better. This time of year encompasses Christmas, originally the celebration of Christ’s birth, Chanukah for those of the Jewish faith and tradition, Kwanzaa for many, and the New Year for all of us on the Gregorian calendar. I have no issue with someone wishing me a Happy Holiday. The word holiday means “holy day.” I consider this entire time of year holy, set apart for reflection and intentional acts of kindness. For me, it is a celebration of Christ’s birth, the One who made a way to God for us, who is God WITH us. It is a celebration of endings and beginnings. The new year marks a do-over for many of us, an expectation of opportunities to love better, play harder, get healthier, enjoy each other more.
I pondered the wealth of tradition shared by the women at our tea and I considered this tradition of clashing words. I know that tradition can be good and right. It is story built into the fabric of our beings. It is the gathered practices of those we love (or not) set as markers for where we have been, stakes in the ground for we stand now and arrows shot into the distance for where we wish to go.
Instead of the annual debate of what to call this time of year, I invite you into a new tradition.
Silence.
For at least fifteen minutes, maybe more, I would like to invite you to be still. Lay under a Christmas tree and stare up at the lights. Sit in front of a Menorah and gaze at the candlelight. Find a place away from the joyful bustle and stressed out shopping and cooking and simply be quiet.
Then, remember. Regardless of your tradition, your ethnicity or identity, this time of year began as a celebration of God wanting relationship with the very ones He created. Jesus may be simply a story to you, a myth. He may be someone or something that makes you angry. You may have experienced deep hurt at the hands or words of someone who claims to love Jesus. I am inviting you to put that aside for a moment. Be still and know…that God is God. It has taken me a very long time to even begin to grasp that God really does love me and that somehow His love can encompass all the beauty and all the ugliness that has been my life.
What will it cost you to enter into this invitation? Find a place of solitude that feeds your soul. Sit in front of a fire with a cup of hot chocolate and be still and listen. Listen for the God you think you already know. Listen for God even if you have never trusted that God exists. Be still and know. It is going to be my new tradition for this time of year. I will take as long as I can and simply be quiet, looking at pretty lights and listening for the Light of the world.
May the peace of Christ be with you.
muddybride 