Christmas reminds us every child
has chance to save world
Behind all the Santa Claus characters, the red bows, the bells and the reindeer that come with Christmas, there is the haunting figure of a child, a scene from another age, a diorama almost lost to this one in the name of political correctness. This child, born to poor parents, birthed in a stable, laid in a manger, watched over by angels and stars, by shepherds and wise men, by Mary and Joseph and the sheep on the hill. This child, we know, is special. But this specialness is also the uncomfortable reminder of other children, equally special, not nearly so well loved in our own time.
Perhaps never in our lives have we had to live with the knowledge of so much violence to children: children beaten, children abandoned, children violated sexually, children unwanted, children starving, children murdered. We wince at the very thought of it. We turn away, turn the dial, turn the conversation in other directions. It is simply too much to think about, too much to deal with.
But why the disbelief? Why the horror? Why the anger? After all, people everywhere are being beaten, killed, raped and murdered. Children are just one more class of the same degradation. So what’s the difference?
The difference is the future. Our future. These children, these innocents are being sacrificed for the breakdown in mental health systems, for the permissiveness of the society, for the toxicity level of the environment, for the violence we take for granted, the violence we condone, the violence we breed in this century. Everyone of them who suffers like this costs us another piece of hope in the future. Every one of them we lose marks the loss of a piece of our own life.
Maybe that’s why Jesus came as a child: to remind us that what we do not care for from infancy will rob us of the future we seek. Will rob us of its intelligence, its creativity, its joy, its sense of possibility, its promise.
Christmas, the birth of Jesus, reminds us that every child born is another chance to save the world, to make it better, to bring it joy.
No doubt about it, the birth of Jesus is a call to all of us to care for the innocent, to protect the defenseless, to build the future.
Make your Christmas merry by giving the child you do not know the opportunity to believe in people, to bring joy into our lives, to grow up better rather than bitter.
Surely Christmas has something important to do with reminding all of us to save the children of the world so that someday they can also save the world for us. (From “Sparks of Advent Light” by Joan Chittister, Benetvision 2008)
