The birth of another way

 

Luke 2: 1-16
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
December 24, 2022

Photo of a small glass orb reflecting the sunrise/sunset sky on the bottom half, the dark black rock and small puddle of water on the upper half, the opposite of the scene in which it rests.

Politics would probably be the last thing you’d expect to hear about on Christmas Eve and yet it was the author of the gospel of Luke who made the birth of Jesus political. From Mary’s song about the reversal of wealth and power to the intentional name-dropping of Caesar Augustus, the birth of Jesus was and is a political challenge to the body politic and to empire. Caesar was also called ‘son of God’ and ‘savior’. Who will we follow, Caesar or Jesus? Even as the story says the government was forcibly moving people, controlling their bodies in order to count them, Mary chose freely to offer herself in solidarity with God’s justice and equity.



Comedian Stephen Colbert, himself a devoted Catholic, said, “If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn’t help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we’ve got to acknowledge that he commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don’t want to do it.” I can’t get over that, along with last night, tonight and tomorrow night will be some of the coldest nights we’ve experienced in this country. People will die as a result of this weather because we continue to be a nation that accepts the suffering and untimely death of others as normal. One disturbing reason the 1946 Christmas movie It’s a Wonderful Life ages so well is that George Bailey’s lament about how long it takes a working person to save $5,000 is still all too true.



In her powerful book, The Sum of Us, author Heather McGhee quotes political scientist Larry Bartels who says that “the preferences of the bottom one-third of the income distribution have no discernable impact on the behavior of their elected representatives.” When I read that sentence I once again acknowledged that I do not want the rich and powerful in charge of the future, no matter what their party is. To me, that is what the Christmas story is all about. The proud are brought low, the poor are filled with good things, and the rich are sent away empty. Shepherds, workers and day laborers, and animals are the first witnesses to this birth.



I don’t want billionaires tanking social media platforms or designing another piece of overpriced technology. I want cities and towns designed for the disabled and accessible public transportation for everyone.



I want the same percentage of women, queer and trans people in Congress as there is in the general population. I want the people who live on the bottom one-third of income distribution making more of our policy decisions. I want White people to take a backseat.



I want Indigenous people in charge of national parks and public lands.



I want people to matter more than property.



I want teachers and students to have everything they need and the Air Force to hold a bake sale for its next bomber.



I want housing and healthcare to be both a public good and a civil right.



I want social justice and generosity to transform the system rather than mitigate the harmful effects of bad public policy.



I want the life of Jesus to mean something more than moralism. I want his birth to mean something more than sentimentalism, an excuse for materialism, a tool for capitalism. I want his death to mean something more than the price that is paid for resistance against empire. I want Christianity to be a vessel of compassion and justice rather than a thinly veiled cover for White supremacy and nationalism.

Poem "I want a president" by Zoe Leonard (1992)
Hear the poet respond and read the text of her poem here: https://youtu.be/8rh7xXSi-l4

Christmas is political. It’s not utopian; it’s messy and chaotic. It’s the world as we know it turned upside down. Christmas is about the embodiment of unconditional love, undeserved, unmerited, and unlimited. Christmas happens anytime that love is embodied in us and in our life together. It is Christmas when we witness another’s pain and choose to disrupt our lives for each other; when we empty ourselves, when we fill impoverished hearts and lives with good things, things that give and sustain life. Christmas happens when we find ourselves in one another, in the least expected other. That is our joy, that is our hope at Christmas.



How will Christmas be born anew in us this season? How will we practice incarnation?



Merry Christmas, Church!

Benediction


For unto us another way is born
Unto us the path of hope and peace is given

And the burden of change shall be upon our shoulders
But the ways of mutual aid and generosity shall lighten each other’s loads.

Rejoice! God is with us as we practice incarnation. Amen.