As many people know, this time of year isn’t ever really one that I thouroughly enjoy. Yeah, I love “going home,” seeing my family, friends, having time off, etc. All those fun things that come with the holiday season. Although, it has always frustrated me how commercial Christmas is. I know this is a cliche comment to make. I know far too many people who claim this. I also know too many people who just stop at that and continue to hate the Christmas season. I for one refuse to continue down this path lest I turn into Scrooge by the time I am 30. That just isn’t right.
I have been comforted in recent years by the tradition of Advent. I think from this point forward, I will look forward to Advent more than Christmas itself. For it is this season of waiting that really prepares me for what Christmas is really about. I think our society, and even the Church today has forgotten this practice of waiting. We are a society that spends $110 billion dollars on fast food each year. Obviously we can’t wait for a simple meal anymore let alone the coming and birth of our savior.
On of my heros, Oscar Romero, said this on Christmas Eve, December 24th, 1978:
“No one can celebrate a genuine Christmas without being truly poor. The self-sufficient, the proud, those who, because they have everything, look down on others, those who have no need even of God - for them there will be no Christmas.
Only the poor, the hungry, those who need someone to come on their behalf, will have that someone. That someone is God, Emmanuel, God-with-us.
Without poverty of spirit there can be no abundance of God.”
Yesterday, at the Northwest Leadership Foundation staff meeting we talked about operating in a mindset of abundance over a mindset of scarcity. Often, in these hard economic times we immediately turn to scarcity, holding on to what is “rightfully” ours. Someone brought up the idea that often in this mindset we operate with the idea that, “in order for me to succeed, someone else has to fail.” The bottom line is the way our country and our world, are operating, we are causing people to fail. My hope is that this economic downturn helps us, helps ME, to realize this.
I myself need to turn away from being, as Romero put it, “The self-sufficient, the proud, who, because they have everything, look down on others, those who have no need even of God.” I need to remember that there are people who can’t go home for Christmas, who have no home to go to for Christmas. There are refugees and immigrants who had tough journeys to get here, yet are unable to return to their families or homes. I am humbled by their arduous sojourn to live in a country of ‘abundance’. Yet, their presence seems to make us operate in scarcity. We are afraid they are taking jobs, that their presence is a threat to us.
I agree with Romero. I would even add that I often act as though I have no need for God as well as no need for the other, for the poor, the disenfranchised, the marginalized, the outcast. I am coming to believe that I need them, that my fate is inextricably bound up with theirs. Not in a paternalistic way. In fact, they don’t really NEED me. I need them more than they need me. I think that the more time we spend with the poor the more we could realize what true abundance is. I believe we live in a false abundance, where we are no longer thankful for what we have and what we receive. May we begin to live in solidarity, working together with the marginalized to understand abundance and bring about a shift on our society’s thinking.
If only I could move my thinking to abundance. If only I could begin to fathom what that would look like if we all began to think this way. I can’t help but dream about they day that I stop hoarding what is ‘rightfully’ mine. The day we can release our resources in a spirit of abundance and think upon the other, rather than ourselves is a day that heaven will come to earth, truly.
I pray that poverty of spirit would strike me at the core this Christmas season so that I can truly appreciate the waiting for and the coming of the Christ child, Emmanuel, God-with-us. Perhaps then I can move from operating in the mindset of scarcity, of impatient waiting, to a mindset of abundance where I can rest in expectant and patient waiting.
