Merry Christmas to all, all year through

By Denville Larry O J Vaughan

There is the “Either-or” Camp. They tell us “choose ye this day whom ye shall serve”. They draw their rhetoric from the Judaic scripture and call upon all others to determine if we are Christian enough to put away the “vile and profane” acts of Carnival.

The roots of these two words have seemed to be one of the bases for differing opinions. While Christmas has retained, somewhat, its original 14th Century meaning of a Eucharistic celebration (mass) of the birth of the Christ child, Carnival on the other hand had had a number of meanings which have been used by both its proponents and its opponents.

At inception, Carnival was a time of merriment that one used as preparation for that liturgical period of fasting known as Lent. As the Lenten period was marked by chaste acts, Carnival was used a period to bid farewell to the flesh. In our local parlance we would say, a time of “one for de road”. Every act of merriment was done in excess to give balance to the ensuing sterile period marked by sacrifice and sobriety.

Over time, the word Carnival took several definitions which ranged from the “celebration of flesh” to a circus as in the United States. It is interesting to note that each differing connotation denoted no religious or spiritual attribute to the word and its related activities.

(Already I hear the zealots singing in unison, “that which is born of the flesh is flesh; that which is born of the spirit is spirit”.)
In the celebration of both events simultaneously, or in rapid succession, as we do in this island, we have not been able to raise Carnival and the flesh to spiritual realms but sadly we have slowly beaten away at the spiritual foundations of Christmas until it too is a period of farewell to the flesh.

We have over the years put on a show at Christmas which is nothing less than putting away our bad habits and snooty behaviours on the account of a day and parade like a circus animal away from its natural habitat.

At Christmas, we meet with family we made no effort to see or consider all year through. It is a period we seek to give gifts in the name of sharing, when the rest of our lives will be spent hoarding goods that “moth doth eat and corrupt”.

At this time of the year, we fall on our knees to hear the angels’ voices but do we ever listen to what they say? These messengers of peace and goodwill ask us to esteem each other, pray for each other, feed the hungry, and strengthen the weak in the name of Him who is love, joy, peace, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle and tempered.

We mark the period by its sacred tones and its pageantry. We even adopt the language of the saints but fail to allow that spirit to make a lasting impression on our hearts and lives.

I treasure a short novel written by John Grisham which speaks to a couple who refused to entertain the thought of undergoing the extra fanciful labours we put ourselves through each year.  They were determined on “Skipping Christmas”. This comedy of errors and misadventure proved that while Christmas has been desecrated on the high altar of commercialization, the spirit and meaning of this day do a lot to bring the world closer.

There is an adventure that is being written on a daily basis which is similar to the Grisham novel. There is a society that daily must come to the realization that peace on earth is not a seasonal sentiment, but must be the hallmark of our lives.
Christmas, therefore, has no meaning if its significance is lost after Boxing Day and rekindled by playing and singing carols in late November. There must be a daily manifestation of our desire to empower and bless our families, our neighbours and all mankind, on a daily basis.

The year 2010 is ahead of us. Let us not spend the upcoming year focusing on the negatives of life. Let us rather seek to be positive. In 2010 let us not seek to fight crime as much as we will be determined to promote peace each day. Let us not identify scourges but let us each, in love, create opportunities of unity and reconciliation.

Daily we lament the number of our sons who have died at the bullet or through violence in its many forms.  In 2010, let us open our eyes to see that there are untold hundreds of our sons who continue to die spiritually as a result of being discriminated against in this our “compassionate society”.

We will not write anyone off anymore. When we write off our sons and daughters, our brothers and sisters we essentially kill them, spiritually. We refuse them the light (knowledge) and nutrients (understanding) needed to grow.

All people need to be loved, and not only at Christmas time.  It is not for anyone to accept the vices a individual may have fallen into but we, each, need to be concerned about our neighbour, to encourage in the ways of wisdom and truth and to show love.

So to the religious zealots who have a problem with Carnival and the “flesh” nature of it, it is time for each of us to reenter the spiritual realm and remain there. Let us examine how we daily “live up” the flesh to lay it down for one day of righteous living. We must be conscious of our light and our daily responsibility to create that atmosphere which encourages our young people to grow like Jesus did - “in wisdom and stature and in favour with God and Man.”

I end by wishing all readers, a very Merry Christmas; and may the spirit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control grow in all our hearts this day always.