“In the service of the infant we are made whole. Every detail of our life is set by it into a single pattern and ordered by a single purpose. We are integrated by the singleness of one compelling love.” - Caryll Houselander (“Wood of the Cradle, Wood of the Cross”)Another December 25th has come and gone. The lethargy of yesterday’s sugar coma is still upon us. Despite my best Advent efforts, I often meet this day with a latent feeling of disappointment. The hype surrounding Christmas makes me long for some spiritual experience of the “It’s a Wonderful Life” variety that assures me of the reality we just celebrated. I want to literally feel my heart grow three sizes.1 I am aware as well as anyone that—as the rather trite saying goes—Jesus is the reason for the season.™But what does that even mean? That phrase, while well-intentioned, has been packaged, sold, and politicized as much as the things it was trying to counteract.
Thankfully, the liturgical calendar, in its wisdom, is here to give some guidance. Standing in seemingly stark contrast to the joyous celebration of Christ’s birth, today is the feast of St. Stephen, best known as the protomartyr of Christianity. He was stoned to death by the Pharisees on the charge of blasphemy. In his final moments, he spoke love to his executioners and prayed that God would forgive them. In a sermon from today’s Office of Readings,2
St. Fulgentius of Ruspe highlights the juxtaposition of these two feast days:Yesterday we celebrated the birth in time of our eternal King. Today we celebrate the triumphant suffering of his soldier. Yesterday our king, clothed in his robe of flesh, left his place in the virgin’s womb and graciously visited the world. Today his soldier leaves the tabernacle of his body and goes triumphantly to heaven.A birth and a death. At first glance, it seems as though these feasts are quite opposite. Yesterday we joyfully celebrated the birth of our Prince of Peace, the one who comes to heal and save, and today we commemorate the cruel death of his follower. Yet upon closer examination, we find that these days are intimately connected. Yes, Christ came so that we might have life in abundance,3 which He ultimately gives to us by crushing Death with death. But as we also know, Christ’s saving sacrifice does not eliminate suffering and death on earth. One need only look around to observe the presence of sickness, loneliness, destruction, and death.
In the closing stanza of his poem “Journey of the Magi,” T.S. Eliot captures the mysterious interplay of life and death present at Christ’s birth. In the voice of one of the magi, he writes:
All this was a long time ago, I remember,Christ’s birth is not simply about His own death; it’s also about ours. The magi’s arduous journey and encounter with the Christ child lead to a transformation, death to a former way of life. This foreign visitor no longer feels at home in his earthly kingdom. His heart is restless. He longs for death.
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.4
The birth of Christ is a great paradox. He comes, clothed in flesh: small, vulnerable, approachable, anonymous. And yet, though He is not in the splendor of His Godhead, it remains true that one cannot look on the face of God and live.5 If we truly see Christ with eyes of faith, we too will die. And this death will not come in a loud or grandiose way. The Christ child’s very mode of existence dictates the way in which we are to die to ourselves every day: in small, vulnerable, anonymous ways.
I have no children of my own, but whenever my older sisters come to visit, bringing my little nieces and nephews, I’m always struck by how radically different life with children is. It takes a few days for me to adjust to having little ones in the house. I have to make sure that nothing dangerous is within reach, that I’m quiet when they’re sleeping. The schedule of our days is determined by their eating and sleeping needs. We can no longer go somewhere on a whim. Everything takes more time. Having children forces a person to alter every aspect of life in many small, often unseen ways. And yet, amidst the sacrifices of parenthood, I have witnessed in my sisters and in my friends with children a deeper joy as they live out their vocation. No amount of parenting books can prepare someone to have children (though it’s still good to prepare), just as no amount of Advent preparation can truly prepare me for the reality of the Christ child’s arrival.
Caryll Houselander rightly observes, “there is nothing more mysterious than infancy, nothing so small and yet so imperious. The infancy of Christ has opened a way to us by which we can surrender self to Him absolutely, without putting too much pressure on our weak human nature.”6
She continues by noting how in preparation for a child, everyone asks “what can I give him?” and yet when the child is born, “he rejects every gift that is not the gift of self, everything that is not disinterested love.” This is the gift of self that St. Stephen gave. In giving his very life for the sake of the Gospel, Stephen teaches us the very meaning of Christ’s birth.
The birth of Christ is a beginning. It is what enables us to alter our lives, to die to ourselves until we can, like Stephen, we can give our all. Fulgentius continues, “Our king, despite his exalted majesty, came in humility for our sake; yet he did not come empty-handed. He brought his soldiers a great gift that not only enriched them but also made them unconquerable in battle, for it was the gift of love, which was to bring men to share in his divinity.”
Christmas, rather than being an escape from suffering, as it is so often conceived of to be, is, in fact, the reality that enables us to suffer, and to suffer well—that is, with love. Just as the coming of a child can open the hearts of his parents to depths of sacrificial love that they never knew before, so, too, the coming of the Christ child invites us to open our hearts to Him, to make a gift of ourselves every day. What he offers in return is not fairytale ending or the Disney-esque spiritual experience we may be looking for, but rather a depth of joy and peace that the world cannot give.
1 Actually, I think that’s a medical condition, so maybe not. ↩
2 Read the whole thing here.↩
3 John 10:10↩
4 Read the rest here.↩
5 Exodus 33:20↩
6 Read the whole thing here. Seriously. Do it.↩
Wonderful and insightful article, Jenny! I will never look at the Feast of St. Stephen and Christmas the same way again. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Lisa! I'm so glad to hear it.
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