With three weeks left until Christmas I finally busted out my holiday decoration mojo. The garlands and lights are up, the poinsettias are lovingly placed and the crystal centerpiece is languishing on the table.
The Nativity scene is in the window. Minus the Wizards.
The mystic in me loves that their were wizard astrologers who saw the signs in the stars and travelled to see Jesus. I remember eating lunch with another blogger who was amazed at the idea that the “Wise Men” were actually wizard astrologers. That’s how good we Christians can be about shoving mysticism under the carpet. They weren’t Mystics! They Were Mysterious People! yeah! No matter how we bowderlise, the fact remains–they were wizards.
The fact also remains that they didn’t show up until Jesus was a young child–two years old or so. I never ever ever put them out with the Baby Jesus nativity, for much the same reason that I don’t put a block of Velveeta cheese there, either. They’re both out of place.
But as I was setting Mary, Joseph, Infant Jesus, Random Shepherd and Sheep on the window sill I got to thinking…is the Nativity idolatry? It is, at its most basic form, a graven image. I know of several families who gather around the nativity scene in their homes for Christmas devotions and prayers.
Whenever I see them they remind me in their own way of Buddhist and Hindu shrines–something that most Christians would call “idolatry” without question. It makes me wonder about people and our need to see what we worship.
The mystic in me has long been uncomfortable with the current fashion of Christian Christmas anyway. All of the desire to reduce the mystical and unknowable Trinity into a knowable thing we can all control–a baby–makes me uneasy. It’s as though we would rather deal with God on our terms so we focus all of our energy on taking the greatest and most infinite and most holy into the weakest and most precarious form of human life imaginable.
I realise the magic of the Birth Of Christ story is that the infinite God allowed itself to be subject to that form for a passing time in order to deliver humans from their finite existence and allow them direct communication with the Divine. (We Christians more commonly call this “salvation” and “prayer”). But it troubles me that the Weak God has become the fetish of our focus. We love the story of God as helpless infant and we love the story of God as a bloodied, dying man. We can’t seem to bear the thought of God as mighty and triumphant and everywhere mystical and existing.
Yes, God did make himself lower than the angels. But that was the act of a supremely magnificent and mystical God. I wish we focused more on that greatness.
wow, Katherine. Don’t know why, but this post really got to me. Thanks for your good thoughts.
That’s one of the reasons why I love the tradition of Lessons & Carols. About half of the “lessons” (scripture readings) are the birth story, the other half are the prophecies, which speak clearly to the destiny of Christ as a ruler, a savior, plus the opening passage of John, which gets pretty darn mystical about it all. I find it to be a nice balance.
that’s a really interesting thought to chew on. thanks.
I think the “baby” part is the most mystic part of the whole narrative. One of my favorite modern Christmas tunes is called “I Am, You Are”. It is sung as a lullaby, but the lyrics to the chorus are a celebration of wonder and mystery:
You are wonderful, little Prince of Peace,
Tiny Counsellor, Almighty God.
You are ancient of days, blessed newborn king,
I Am, you are.
Sending my kids to catholic school has made me rethink where the “idolotry line” is. To outside eyes, the “thing” might seem to be to object of worship, but most of the time, it is not. At least, no more than banners or stained glass. Some people just need visuals. Although I’m a “word” guy, I know we’re not all built the same.
And, in a friendly tweek, I’ll ask about the wise men: if you’re going to be that literal about it, why bother celebrating on December 25th?
…running…
Our house has a homemade Nativity that we put together with our daughter when she was two. Beyond the toilet-paper roll angels and shepherds and wise men and the cotton-ball sheep (who, as you point out, are not really yet supposed to be there), it has a number of Scripturally unauthorized visitors (like a set of plastic Teletubbies, two ceramic rabbits, a wooden elephant, a miniature Elmo, and some “people” that stopped by from the Playmobil railway and fair set that we set up nearby.) My kid insisted that everything should come and adore and we really couldn’t argue with her logic. However, she also knew even at the time that a peanut Jesus was not the Savior Himself. It’s the simultaneity of the two opposites — wholly God/man, omnipotent/utterly vulnerable — that challenges contemplative people to see beyond the form to think about the essence. The word “red” is not the color, either. We use symbols to represent stuff all the time, so I’m not seeing why this is a particularly offensive use.
And rest assured, no one controls a baby. They are an incredible lesson in having to submit yourself wholly to another.
“And rest assured, no one controls a baby. They are an incredible lesson in having to submit yourself wholly to another.”
OMG bridgett, how tue.
Catholics usually don’t put the magi there until Twelfth Night, right? So at least they’re acknowledging the time lag.
Right. In a more devout home, the wizards would come out on Epiphany (of the Feast of the Three Kings, depending on which part of the world you’re in). But in a more devout home, we also wouldn’t have to guard the Jebeezus (my kid’s original name for the Christ Child) against the predatory urges of a peanut-loving feline.
Normal nativity sets usually don’t bother me, unless they are populated by California Raisins. Then that is a little weird.
i’d prefer to think of the extras as omitted from the formal scripture document rather than scripturally unauthorized.