Tidings of excess and joy

By Gerry Bowler and ChristianWeek | December 15, 2007

Statistics Canada, that ever-vigilant watch-dog of all we think, do and spend, has been keeping its Argus eyes on Christmas, and what it tells us is no surprise to anyone who has tried to find a parking place at a big-box store these past few weeks.

The celebration of the nativity of our Lord is big business in Canada. Our expenditures on festive decoration, drinking, feasting and gifts will amount to more than $30 billion this year.

More than half of the toys sold during the year will be bought at Christmas and there is a similarly disproportionate bulge in the sale of jewelry, books, clothing, DVDs, CDs and media players. Cosmetic and fragrance companies would go out of business if it weren't for Christmas. As would the purveyors of motorized tie racks, snow globes and animated plastic fish programmed to sing "Don't Worry, Be Happy."

Such consumer excesses must give the conscientious Christian pause. Can we really defend such an outlay when there are millions around the world starving? The answer, of course, is "yes."

To the earnest zealots of the Buy Nothing Christmas movement such a reply must seem trite or heartless. Who but a callous stooge of our bloated capitalist bosses could advocate the scarcely-bridled consumerism that infects us annually? Surely all Christians ought to raise a cheer when Anabaptist sandalistas invade malls singing:

"The TV's on (are you watching?)
Another product that they're hawking.
One more thing that you need, to make life complete.
Welcome to ConsumerWonderland."

Not this little black duck. I'm the kind of Christian who knows the difference between Christmas and Lent and thinks there is a proper place in our lives for each season.

There is a sad tendency in some strands of current North American Christianity to treat Christmas as a social dysfunction. For reasons that have more to do with class warfare and opposition to economic globalization than with spirituality, these neo-Puritans of the left seek to induce guilt amongst the faithful over our celebration of the birth of Jesus.

What our angst-ridden brethren forget at this time of year is that excess and joy go hand in hand. We celebrate out of a sense of abundance and we share our bounty with our friends and neighbours; we know that there are times for frugality and restraint and times for generosity and abundance. The wise men made a journey far more difficult than a trip to the local mall, all to bring spectacularly excessive gifts to the Babe: gold, frankincense and myrrh—they did not leave Mary and Joseph a tract suggesting that used CDs make thrifty tree ornaments.

Downplaying Christmas is a tendency that has its roots deep in Protestant history, though it is one that has more often been found on the Calvinist branch of the family tree. In England, Scotland, the Netherlands and some American colonies the followers of the John Calvin did their best to exterminate the celebration of the Nativity. They cited the lack of biblical sanction for such a holiday and, like their present-day counter-parts, argued against excess in drink, feasting and consumption. Their chief opponent for many years was King James VI of Scotland (aka James I of England) who forced the dour Scots to observe Christmas in the jolly English fashion and who defended what he termed "the right to be merry."

This endorsement of the right to be indulgent at Christmas is not meant to encourage credit card bondage or, as Bill McKibben puts it, to teach the equation of delight with materialism, but it is a plea for Christians to understand that the season of the Nativity is not one meant for denial. The early Church computed the date of those miraculous events in Bethlehem to be midwinter, the darkest and coldest time of the year—a time that recognized our human need for light, greenery and warmth and made a bold affirmation that this shivering little baby would be our Sun and our ever-green Tree.

Honi soit qui mal y pense and shame on those Christians who would shame their brothers and sisters for wanting to make merry as they mark this Child's birth.