Christmas through new eyes

BY FRANCIS CORREIA

As a mother of three very small children my perspective on Christmas has changed fundamentally. Before I had babies I was annoyed by the early appearance of Christmas trees and decorations, the playing of hymns and the general hype in any shopping experience.

Now, however, I see it all anew through my one and three year olds’ eyes. My youngest daughter and my son love going into shopping centres. My one-year-old daughter’s whole body shakes with the intense excitement of Christmas decorations. My son will happily spend ages staring in wonder at lit-up trees and the shinny balls hidden in wreaths. Their delight and wonder fill me with a new sense of finding God present in the busy malls.

My eldest daughter is five years old, and she is beginning to get her head around some of the theological concepts associated with Christmas. She knows that it is Jesus’ birthday; that Jesus is God; and that he came to make things “good” in the world.

As we were driving recently, we came across a beggar who asked us for food or clothing. She asked where he lived and discovered that he didn’t have a home. As we drove on she wanted to know what we were going to do to help him.

A few days later I was asked: “That man, the man who needs a home, will Father Christmas give him a home for Christmas?” When I replied that it was unlikely, she asked if we would.

These two moments seem to say much to my faith; my younger children’s awe and delight, their recognition of the transcendent breaking through in our ordinary lives, symbolised by the glittering trees and decorations. And my elder daughter’s awareness of someone else’s need and her heartfelt sense that we needed to do something about it, speaks to me of our response to God’s love.

God initiates and we respond. God loves us so much that Jesus chooses to become one of us. Our lives are transformed and redeemed by his love. Our response: to become more like the God we love, more generous, more concerned, more involved; seeing in others, most especially in the poor and afflicted, the face of Christ. Motivated to love others because he has loved us.

My children’s fresh and intense response to what they find in the world is a real challenge to me. It is so easy to live behind the adult rationalisations that I can’t do anything for beggars on the street corners, and so I don’t try.

I cynically see the Christmas decorations as yet another inducement to spend. In my children’s response to the world there is a clarity that reminds me of Jesus’ invitation to become like little children. To see the world with their openness and innocence.

My daughter cannot understand or do anything about the economic forces that have led to this man being on the street begging. But she can imagine things she (and her mother) could concretely do to help him. That may not change the country’s unemployment situation, but it would affect this one person.

If we look at the birth of Jesus, he did not come as the expected new King David to overthrow the Roman occupation or reform the Sanhedrin; nor did he heal every sick person in Israel. But he did heal and touch the lives of the individuals he met in his wandering.

As Christians, we are called to be like Jesus: to reach out and touch the lives of the people we come across each day. If we live with a sense of the wonder of the incarnation, the awe inspiring reality that God who loves us passionately, is with us, then it follows that we will be inspired to love others as Jesus did.

Frances Correia is a spiritual director and trainer in Ignatian Spirituality at the Jesuit Institute in Johannesburg.