Merry 3rd Day of Christmas!

Whew. Last week was crazy, beginning with Maura being in the hospital for double pneumonia 4 days before Christmas. Thank God, she has responded well to the antibiotics. A friend forwarded this article to an e-mail list and I wanted to share it here. He says much better what I was trying to get at in my last post. Meanwhile, Merry 3rd day of Christmas!

2005.12.25 Charleston Post Courier:

Whatever happened to the 12 Days of Christmas?
By Fr. John Parker

Christmas, as far as its "public" celebration is concerned, is just another proverbial frog in the kettle. In fact, Christmas in the public market was boiled long ago and replaced with a certain generic "holiday" whose central figures are candy canes, snowmen and elves. Recent articles paint the dreadful picture well. One describes an elementary school where the giving-tree, adorned with tags listing gifts one could purchase for needy families, was ordered to be taken down because the star on top indicated Christmas. Another describes a public library in Tennessee where Mary, Joseph, Jesus and the Magi were ordered to be removed from a public creche, leaving only the wild animals and a shepherd boy in an empty stable. Ironically, there is now plenty of room in the inn.

In the commercial realm, savvy marketers have tapped a significant vein and made millions on bigger-than-life-size versions of Frosty the Snowman and his companions, all of whom began to decorate yards around Thanksgiving. It is likely that the only snow one really will see this month in the Lowcountry is faux and held captive in numbers of front yards in 8-foot, inflatable plastic snow globes, reminiscent of the original coffee-table souvenirs one might buy in colder-weather climes.

It is not unreasonable to ask, "When do 'the holidays' begin anyway?" This year, earlier than ever, as several radio stations between Charleston and Hilton Head Island raced to be the first to play nonstop Chrisatmas music - before Thanksgiving. Stores and outlets all around opened as early as 6 a.m. on Nov. 25, Black Friday. (Another irony: The only other "named" Friday of the year is "Good Friday," on which Jesus Christ's crucifixion is commemorated. The day after Thanksgiving would better be named "Lucre Friday," since the aim is to make as much money as possible!)

Headline photographs in newspapers and magazines showed people standing in long lines, each with several televisions and dozens of DVDs nearly cascading out of their baskets. IPods, Blackberrys, the latest fashions, whatever, all for sale at alluring prices to kick off the "happy
holidays" in the "season of giving." But Christmas is not a generic holiday intended to boost the economy. It is a specific holy day, the second holiest day on the Christian calendar, on which the Incarnation of God, when God became truly human, is celebrated. It falls on a certain day and has certain meaning.

The word "Christmas" can even speak for itself: It means "the Mass (Holy Communion) of Christ." How can one truly, legitimately and fully celebrate Christmas (on some other day!) without the newborn king and in the absence of Holy Communion?

In the churches that have any connection at all to the church found on the pages of the New Testament, feasts in general (and Christmas specifically) have never been celebrated in advance of the day; rather, they are prepared for by times and seasons of repentance.

In the Orthodox Church, the Nativity fast lasts 40 days, from Nov. 15 to Dec. 24, as a mirror to Great Lent, the 40 days before Pascha (Easter). In the Roman Catholic Church and other "liturgical" churches, Advent is four weeks long. These seasons are not marked by Christmas carols and the greetings of the feast, but rather are spent anticipating, longing, waiting for the birth of Christ. Consider the crescendo: Fasting to prepare. Expectation. Days of tiredness, weariness and heightened anticipation. "O come, O come Emmanuel!" Then Christmas. The feast. The feasting. The celebration. All is light. Joy to the world. Christ is born! Glorify him! The feast begins with Holy Communion on the 25th, and the celebration lasts several days. The long days of fasting in anticipation of the feast are matched thereafter with numerous days of feasting. On the eighth day, we celebrate the circumcision of our Lord, who was submitted to the Law to fulfill it, as noted in Luke 2:21, whereon "he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb."

The feasting continues (fasting is forbidden!) until the 11th day after Christmas, when we pause to prepare for Theophany, the baptism of Christ.

In the Western church, this 12th day of Christmas is called Epiphany and is celebrated as the coming of the Magi who "open(ed) their treasures, (and) offered him gifts, gold, frankincense and myrrh" (Matthew 2:11) as signs of Jesus' kingship, his divinity and his impending death, respectively.

In the Orthodox tradition, we sing boldly about them, chanting: "For they who did worship the stars, were taught by a star to adore Thee, the Son of Justice, and to know Thee, the Orient from on High, O Lord, glory to Thee!"

Contrast this ancient, venerable and biblical pattern to some shocking local news: There are numbers of local churches that will not celebrate Christmas or hold any services on Christmas Day this year. Sunday is canceled!

These groups fail to see the true nature of Christian feasts, especially by making "the family" the focus of Christmas instead of Christ. Or worse, they won't hold services (to worship God) because "it would be poor use of resources on that day."

What a change from "Come, let us adore Him" to "It doesn't make good business sense. Stay home and indulge yourselves."

Once again, consider secular society's cycle of feasts. One flows from one nameless, rootless holiday to the next, pausing only enough to change the yard ornaments and end-of-aisle displays.

So much so that everything is a feast. And when everything is a feast, nothing at all is, as the "feast" is turned into perpetual, ceaseless self-indulgence of all sorts: spiritual, financial, familial, emotional, culinary, etc.

In the secular view (which is its own religion, make no mistake about it), the "winter holidays" as November-December are now fashionably called, are 30 days of feasting (Nov. 25-Dec. 25), including gluttonous "holiday" parties and countless opportunities and excursions to buy more things.

All of this is consummated for many in a Christ-less Christmas, followed by throwing out the Christmas tree on Dec. 26. Shortly thereafter comes the purchase of silver-glittered top hats for the New Year, and in January, possibly as early as Jan. 2, we will see Cupid in the stores.

It is certainly not Christ who is worshipped in this season, but Visa, and if not Visa, then surely "stuff and its accumulation."

If we were to rewrite the classic carol "The 12 Days of Christmas," it might be shortened to one verse that would read: "On the last day of Christmas (Dec. 26), I looked outside to see, by the trash can my neighbor's holiday tree."

But Christmas Day is not the end of Christmas; in fact, it is just the beginning of the Incarnation of the Word of God, our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ. It is not too late to celebrate Christmas as his Nativity, even including the 12-day feast.

We only have to change our minds.

Fr. John Parker is priest-in-charge of Holy Ascension Orthodox Church in I'On. This article appeared in The Post and Courier and updated online at Charleston.net on Sunday, December 25, 2005.