Christmas 2018
Can anyone tell me what Christmas is all about? – Charlie Brown
We Americans like to boast that we are the best country in the world, with the best of everything. We like to boast of our natural resources, our military, our traditions, and our power. We like public officials and celebrities who tickle our ears with such talk. We want to believe that, even now, we Americans stand astride the world like a Colossus – invincible, dominant, able to impose our will on everyone else. We are strong, we are great, we are the best. We believe – or want very much to believe – all these things about ourselves.
We still have the most powerful military in the world. We have an overload of nuclear weapons. We are still the world’s largest economy. Many more people want in on America than want out. Even now.
If all that is true, why do we see so much anger among us? Why such divisions between us? Why is it that, when one group of people become off-limits to prejudice, we immediately find another?
We are afraid. Fear rules our hearts, and we refuse to acknowledge it. We fear even the feeling of fear. We do our best to bury it by bravado. We distract it by finding scapegoats to blame for our problems. We vote for people who promise us security. We insure everything imaginable. Our family vehicles are larger, looking more like military transports than like anything designed with kids in mind. Despite an increase in mass shootings, many of us still scream and invoke fire and brimstone if anyone dares whisper the words “gun control”. We speak of walls and yet more weapons, and yet more people die by these same weapons.
What is the greatest sign of fear? It is how we react to people who are the most vulnerable; those who have no weapons, money, or influence. Even in our schools, some kids instinctively seek out the different, the weak, as targets for bullying and “jokes”. We mock the disabled, and elect politicians who do so. We sanction the continued deaths of hundreds of thousands of the unborn. We show open contempt for the poor, the unemployed, and the immigrant (legal or illegal).
This is all due to fear – unrecognized, unacknowledged fear. Fear rules us. Fear is a tyrant that will have its way and will brook no rivals. And, as we have seen, nothing brings out the wrath of the false god Fear more powerfully than vulnerability.
Why so? Why would vulnerability, seeming weakness, seem like such a threat to those who are ruled by Fear?
People who are vulnerable – and, worse, those who choose to be so – unmask Fear’s whole scheme. They announce by their gentle, loving presence that there is another way to live, a way without all the signs of Fear. They present an inner strength that no gun, no wall, no SUV can provide. They prove that Fear is groundless and baseless. This emperor has no clothes. That is why those who fear the most hate the vulnerable the most. It is those who seem most vulnerable who possess the most real power, as this is how God operates.
Suppose you were given a great deal of power, like some comic book hero. You might want to help others, or even save the world. How would you go about doing it? Well, you’d want to use the powers you were given and defeat the bad guys, just as we see in movie after movie. This, too, is fear-based, and a misunderstanding of what real power and real salvation look like.
Suppose you were God, and had ultimate power. What would you do then?
Well, what did God actually do? he did not launch a D-Day-like invasion of the world, with legions of angels, to impose salvation by fear. This changes nothing. It only replaces one fear-worshipping tyrant with another. What does God do?
He comes in the most vulnerable way possible. He chooses a conquered nation. He chooses unknown, powerless (by the world’s estimation) people, Mary and Joseph, as the mother and foster-father of His Son. They go to Bethlehem in their vulnerability. No one has room for them. Nor do we, for the vulnerable in our midst. They end up in a stable, where Jesus is born. An utterly vulnerable, defenseless baby. Not a superhero. Not a soldier. A baby. This is how God comes to us.
Not only does He find no welcome even in Bethlehem, but the powers that be want Him dead as soon as they get wind of Him. A powerless baby, inciting such fear! Jesus is already unmasking Fear’s game, and Fear will have none of it. It reacts in the only way it knows. Create fear. Ridicule. Attack. Kill. Destroy.
Though Jesus is not killed then, the game isn’t over. As an adult, Jesus will show special care for the most vulnerable around Him. This will, once again, create fear in Fear. Jesus is opposed, very quickly. It’s not long before His enemies succeed in arresting Him.
But as so often happens, when people act out of Fear. they create the thing they most fear. Jesus is made as vulnerable as He was as that baby in Bethlehem. He is stripped of disciples, of freedom, of human respect, of his very clothing, and is nailed to a cross. And yet, it is Jesus’ acceptance of all this, in utter trust in the Father and without fear, that turns what looks like utter defeat into total victory. By His willingness to live and die in vulnerability, Jesus breaks the power of Fear. By His Resurrection, He removed the last threat Fear can offer – the threat of death – and shows even that fear to be groundless. He reveals Fear to be that emperor with no clothes in the end.
How does one live out this message, this Good News, of the defeat of Fear? By living courageously enough to allow ourselves to be vulnerable, even defenseless, at least some of the time. It’s the firm conviction that, no matter what the situation feels like, God has our back. Even death can’t change that. So…
Tell someone you know about a weakness of yours, not a strength. Tell someone about a need you have, not great things you can do. Yes, this is a risk. It takes far more courage to be vulnerable like this than to stand behind a gun or a wall and hurl insults at the defenseless. Some may take advantage of you. It is possible.
Something else may happen, though. The person you tell might be struck by the power of your trust and feel disarmed. That person might know that it is safe to be vulnerable, in turn, with you. You may find yourself blessed, in turn, with this person’s trust in you. That disarms you and opens you both to something else. Actually, Someone Else. God, who is… not Fear, or Force, or Money, or Guns, but… Love. Sheer Love. Love needs no weapons. Vulnerable love is the ultimate weapon. It can disarm anyone, show that Fear is powerless in the end, and open our inner doors to God’s onrushing love. That is why Fear – aka Satan – hates the vulnerable. Love undoes Fear’s schemes and replaces it with something so awesome, so wondrous, that Fear becomes pointless. We learn that, even now, Love has our backs. We learn that, even now, Christ walks among us.
This is why Jesus said, so often, “Be not afraid”. That is why St. John Paul II repeated those words so often. Perfect love casts out fear. It literally exorcises our demons, and leads us to a new birth in joy and true freedom.
Yes, celebrate Christmas. Celebrate the infinite power of that vulnerable, helpless Baby. That power is given to you, to me, to us.
Will we be brave enough to use it?