Christmas Is God Brought Near
Last week my latest essay, “Christmas is God Brought Near”, was published online on the Acton Institute’s website:
A perennial theme of modern holiday classics, from the ridiculous Jingle All the Way to the sublime A Charlie Brown Christmas, is the conspicuous absence of the Christmas spirit during Christmas season. In each case, the Christmas spirit is recovered. The acquisitiveness and rivalry that consumes Jingle All the Way’s protagonist is ultimately transcended by a spirit of giving and brotherhood, while the materialism and ennui in A Charlie Brown Christmas evaporates before a simple and unadorned telling of the story of Christ’s nativity. While it is true that we are forever distracted by the world, the flesh, and the devil, Christmas offers us an opportunity to refocus. In short, it’s different.
During this time of year, even in our secular age, Christ is not conspicuously absent but conspicuously present. Even the most miserly Scrooge and the grinchiest Grinch know, if not quite realize, the reason for the season. Christmas is, by divine providence, a season when even people who are walking in darkness have occasion to see a great light.
Full essay here. Merry Christmas!
