“CHRISTMAS: The Transient and the Permanent”

A Sermon by the Rev. Bruce Clear

Sunday, December 19, 2010

All Souls Unitarian Church

Indianapolis, Indiana

Nancy and I were recently invited to a relative’s home to participate in what they called the ritual “hanging of the greens.” This is the phrase they use to describe decorating the house for the holidays, including their Christmas tree. There were, in fact, very specific rules as to what goes where and how the decorating must be done.

The rules for decorating were declared, and the rules were issued all in fun, announced, as it were, with tongue in cheek. One rule, for example, was that in hanging tinsel on the tree, one must apply those tiny aluminum slivers, one sliver, one tinsel, at a time. It will not do to toss a handful of tinsel onto the branches, we were told. One tinsel at a time, and each must be placed on a branch that does not already display any other form of ornament! If you are caught violating these rules, you will be dismissed as a tinsel hanger!

We all laughed at the rules, of course, and had a great time. It turned out, however, that the rules were very effective in creating a beautiful Christmas tree.

Christmas is the quintessential holiday of traditions. The celebration hungers for doing things each year in the same way. It might be the only example where grown children acknowledge that their parents were absolutely right in what they did. My parents, your parents, created Christmas traditions the way they are supposed to be celebrated – any variation is somehow heretical.

Some of you will know immediately my reference in the title of this sermon: “The Transient and the Permanent” with regard to Christmas. It invokes one of the most celebrated documents of Unitarian history – a sermon delivered in 1841 by the great abolitionist and Unitarian Minister Theodore Parker. The sermon was entitled “The Transient and the Permanent in Christianity,” and he attempted to identify that which is essential to Jesus’ teaching and that which is non-essential.

I am suggesting this morning it may be enlightening to look at the celebration of Christmas through a similar lens --- what is essential and permanent on one hand, and what is non-essential or transient, on the other. For example, in general, one might argue that having traditions has become a crucial part of this holiday. But most of us would agree, along with my good-natured relatives – that hanging tinsel one sliver at a time probably doesn’t rise to the status of being essential to celebrating Christmas.

To approach the idea of the transient and the permanent in Christmas, I find it helpful to look at the history of this holiday; and as it turns out, Christmas, especially in this country, has a deeply fascinating history. Much of what I have to say about the history of Christmas can be found in a fascinating book by Stephen Nissenbaum, an historian at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. The book is entitled “The Battle for Christmas,” and it was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1996.

In that book, Nissenbaum points out that what we think of as “traditions” associated with Christmas are in fact “invented” traditions. For some reason, we tend to think calling something a “tradition” denies that it wasn’t simply created to become a tradition.

This point begins with the day itself, of course: December 25. There is no historical or even biblical evidence that Jesus was born on that day. On the contrary, most biblical scholars seem to be persuaded by evidence that Jesus was born in the spring – probably March or April.

So why December 25? It is well established that in the fourth century the Roman church chose that date to correspond with an already well-established pagan solstice celebration called Saturnalia, which honored the god Saturn.

A major practice of the Roman holiday was a reversal of social roles. For one day, slaves and their masters exchanged places, and slaves feasted on the best food and drink and were served by their masters. It turns out that this pagan practice actually became attached to Christmas traditions as the church evolved, so that over a 1,000 year later, during the Middle Ages, the major part of Christmas celebration was this reversal of roles. On Christmas Day, the poor demanded, and expected, handouts from the rich. The wealthy classes complied. Here is how Nissenbaum described it:

“The poor – most often bands of boys and young men – claimed the right to march to the houses of the well-to-do, enter their halls, and received gifts of food, drink, and sometimes money as well. And the rich had to let them in. Christmas was a time when peasants, servants, and apprentices exercised the right to demand their wealthier neighbors and patrons treat them as if they were wealthy and powerful.”

This reversal of roles was an essential Christmas tradition for centuries, and it eventually led to stunning excesses – public drunkenness and lawlessness. Nissenbaum pointed out that Christmas inspired behavior that would be shocking today. “The rules that governed people’s public behavior,” he wrote, “were momentarily abandoned in favor of an unrestrained ‘carnival,’ a kind of December Mardi Gras.” An Anglican minister in Newcastle observed that for many Englishmen, Christmas was merely “a pretense for Drunkenness, and Rioting, and Wantonness.”

This was the true tradition of Christmas at the time the American colonies were formed by English ex-patriots. But the Puritans, who ruled the colonies in the early years, would have none of it. They knew that December 25 was a day chosen by Roman Catholics to join with pagan holidays. Even more, they were scandalized by what they saw as widespread debauchery associated with Christmas. So for most of the early years of Puritan New England America, Christmas was outlawed. Businesses were required to remain open. Government offices would continue their normal work. And any private celebration of Christmas was a criminal offense, subject to fines.

But while Puritan Boston came down hard on Christmas partiers, other parts of America continued the wild revelry associated with Christmas, including the reversal of roles where the poor demanded from the rich. In Anglican New York, rather than Puritan Boston, Christmas Day was a drinking day, and tavern drinks were free. Young men would begin drinking as early as possible and be drunk before noon. In 1852, Horace Greeley wrote in his newspaper, the New York Tribune, that by ten in the morning on Christmas Day he saw:

“about a dozen parties of boys, each numbering from four to ten persons, nearly every one grossly drunk, and four fellows, in as many parties, entirely helpless, and being dragged along by the neck and heels by their hardly less drunk companions.”

So this was Christmas in early America. When I hear people today speak of treasuring the old Christmas traditions, I’m guessing they don’t want to go too far back in time to claim those traditions.

Something needed to be done. This was getting out of hand. The Puritan banishment of Christmas clearly wasn’t the answer, and the all-out anarchy of society elsewhere wasn’t working. Slowly – very slowly – efforts were made to turn Christmas celebration away from public partying to family and church celebrations. And the transformation worked, though a bit of the old tradition remains in office Christmas parties. Most of what was the traditional Christmas celebration has been transferred now to New Year’s Eve.

It turns out that the Unitarians and Universalists played a few pivotal roles in the transformation of Christmas to a family and church celebration. I read earlier how Nissenbaum singles out Universalist and Unitarian Churches for their advocating the observance of Christmas with church services.

Nissenbaum also acknowledges how Unitarian theology played a role in the transformation of Christmas in early America.

Both the Puritans and the orthodox churches subscribed to the theology of John Calvin and his interpretation of original sin. According to this doctrine, we are born with the stain of sin, the desire for evil, and the destiny of eternal damnation. Human will is not enough to save us. We cannot choose salvation, for we are helpless. Only God can choose to save us. “Puritan-minded parents, and their nineteenth century successors, therefore felt that it was their obligation to break a child’s will as early as possible.” This theology instructed good parents to extinguish the child’s will, since human will is innately corrupt, and to correct that child into submission to parental authority.

From the outset, Unitarian theology, on the contrary, rejected the church-created doctrine of original sin as un-biblical, unhealthy, and dangerous. Children are born with innate ability to choose good. Children are born with innate dignity and worth. The job of the parent, under this view, is to train and guide the child’s will, to instruct the child to make good choices. As Nissenbaum put it, “Unitarians strenuously believed that human beings were responsible – utterly responsible – for their own actions,” and fully capable of acting responsibly through a well-trained will. Unitarian minister Theodore Parker put it this way:

“Men often speak of breaking the will of a child; it seems to me they had better break the neck. The will needs regulation, not destroying. I should as better think of breaking the legs of a horse in training him, as [of breaking] a child’s will.” (p. 203)

As an historian of Christmas, Nissenbaum suggests that Unitarians played an important role in the successful move to place children as the cultural focus of the Christmas celebration, and move Christmas traditions from the streets and the gutters into the home. Today, so many of what we call Christmas “traditions” were created in order to highlight the celebration of children at Christmas. The Santa Claus story was invented for children’s interest, and so was gift giving, the colorful decorations, and the Christmas tree.

In fact, the Christmas tree tradition has a direct Unitarian connection. The practice was, of course, originally tied to pagan celebrations, but eventually the specific decoration for trees at Christmas and New Years became common in Germany. It was first promoted in this country by a prominent immigrant from Germany, Charles Follen, who became a Unitarian minister and a Professor of languages at Harvard. He would regularly decorate a tree to delight his son each year, and in 1835, he invited an English writer, Harriet Martineau, to be present when the tree was decorated. Martineau wrote of the experience, and her story received wide distribution and the Christmas tree received approving publicity.

This tree would become yet another “invented” Christmas tradition.

The transcendentalist writer, and Unitarian, Margaret Fuller wrote of the connection between the spirit of children and the spirit of the Christmas tree with these words:

“Christmas would seem to be the day peculiarly sacred to children, and something of this feeling shows itself among us. . . The evergreen tree is often reared for the children on Christmas evening, and its branches cluster with little tokens that may, at least, give them a sense that the world is rich, and that there are some in it who care to bless them. It is a charming sight to see their glittering eyes, and well worth much trouble in preparing the Christmas tree.”

Over the years, Unitarians have made quite a few contributions to the many traditions of Christmas, including a number of Christmas Carols. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,” for example, or carols of Unitarian minister Edmund Sears, such as “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear.” Even the one most familiar to all children, “Jingle Bells,” came from the pen of James Pierpont, Music Director at the Unitarian Church of Savannah, Georgia.

The second most famous Christmas story of all time, A Christmas Carol, was a gift from the Unitarian writer Charles Dickens. Few stories have had more influence in spreading Unitarian values than this one. Even the most rigid and dogmatic creedal apologist would concede, I think, that this document expresses the true spirit of Christmas, all done without sectarian references of any kind.

From all of this, I hope we can affirm the point that Christmas traditions evolve. They are invented, and when they work they become tradition. As one UU blogger pointed out on this, Mary did not sing “Silent Night” to the baby in the manger – that song came later. Much later. In German, of course. The English version came much later than that. The Silent Night we sing is not the original, it is one among 300 English translations compiled on a website of Christmas Carols.

If the “true” English translation were the first one among the 300 listed, made in 1849, we would be singing

Silent night! hallowed night!
Land and deep silent sleep;
Softly glitters bright Bethlehem's star.
Beckoning Israel's eye from afar
Where the Saviour is born.

Or perhaps the “true” English version is the most recent translation listed among the 300. If so, we would be singing:

Silent night! Holy night!
Sleeps the earth, calm and quiet;
Lovely Child, now take thy rest:
On thy mother’s gentle breast
Sleep in heavenly peace!
Sleep in heavenly peace!

If it is important to sing the “true” original version, it must be done in German. Our hymnal offers the German version at Hymn no. 252.

The evolution of Christmas includes re-writes of stories and carols. The changing of hymns has a long and easily documented history. For example, I’m sure you’re familiar with the famous Christmas carol from the great Methodist leader Charles Wesley. You know, “Hark, How All the Welkin Rings! Glory to the King of Kings.”

“How all the Welkin Rings” you ask? Well, I had to look it up, too. “Welkin” a word once used to describe the vault of the sky where God resides. One isn’t surprised to learn that Wesley’s words were to become permanently changed: “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, Glory to the Newborn King.”

The point is, simply, that traditions evolve. And that includes music, includes hymns, includes Christmas Carols.

So here is my summary of the development of the Christmas traditions. We seek to understand what is essential and what is non-essential to Christmas – what is transient and what is permanent.

Fortunately, our friend Garrison Keillor has given us an opportunity to reflect on that question. I read earlier his strong views on Unitarians and Christmas, so I review my thoughts though a letter I have drafted that I will send to him. Here is my letter:

Dear Mr. Keillor,

I begin this letter with a comment which begins probably begins the majority of letters you receive: I have been a big fan. I have been a big fan of yours for decades. You and your humor have provided profound comfort and happiness to so many of us for so many years. For that I thank you.

I am writing about your essay published on Salon.com last December, 2009, entitled “Don’t Mess with Christmas.” This letter is embedded in a sermon I am delivering to my congregation at All Souls Unitarian Church in Indianapolis, Indiana. I have read excerpts from your essay to them, and I am attaching to this letter a copy of the sermon I am giving, which you are invited to read. I am reading this letter as is a part of that sermon. Over the years I have delivered sermons containing similar letters, and none have elicited responses. I wrote to George W. H. Bush, and Bill Clinton, and Susan B. Anthony, and none of them responded. (O.K., I never expected something from Susan B. Anthony. I hope you don’t fall into that category.)

Most of us Unitarian Universalists have laughed at your occasional references to Unitarians over the years. They have seemed good-natured and mostly on the mark. Your salon.com essay last Christmas seems to be the exception. Some believe that what you wrote was intended more as satire than as sarcasm. That may be so (I hope), but it clearly was not as effective as other satire you have written.

I have sympathy for part of your positions. Let me illustrate that with a story. Almost twenty years ago, Unitarian Universalist Association appointed a Hymnbook Commission to revise our hymnal. I attended a hearing with that Commission, and at some point a friend of mine stood up and declared, “Whatever you do, don’t mess with the Christmas Carols!” Actually, he didn’t use the word “mess” – it was a much, much stronger word, a word that can’t be broadcast on network television of on your radio program or, for that matter, in my sermons. He meant it the way you meant it when you gave the title, “Don’t Mess with Christmas.”

Well, I was surprised to see my friend’s loud admonition inspire broad applause within the room. I was even more surprised to notice that I joined heartily in that applause. So I say, I have sympathy for your position. I admire traditions, or otherwise I wouldn’t have written the this sermon on Christmas traditions.

And I was disappointed when the hymnal came out. They messed with the Christmas Carols, and that is unfortunate. It is not as awful as when I learned that my country adopted a policy of torture. Certainly not as awful as that. Nor is it as unsavory as the Ponzie Scheme by Bernie Madoff. But it was disappointing. I am most disturbed about what they did to “I Heard the Bells.” The biggest offense was not changing the words, replacing “goodwill to men” with “to all goodwill.” The biggest offense was attaching “I Heard the Bells” to an unfamiliar tune. That approaches unforgivable.

I was disappointed in the changes they made on Christmas Carols, but I understand it. After all, what they did was consistent with the advice given by the greatest hymn writer of all time, Isaac Watts, who wrote in 1707 these words:

“What is provided for public worship should give to sincere consciences as little vexation and disturbance as possible. . . . Where any unpleasing word is found, he that leads the worship may substitute a better; for (Blessed be God) we are not confined to the words of any Man in our public solemnities.^”

In recent years, I have been dismayed by the growth of what has come to be called the “Christmas Wars.” I refer to that crusade which claims that the phrase “Happy Holidays” is only used by low-life god-haters and “Merry Christmas” is the only acceptable greeting at this time of year. Your essay reads like a battle plan for the Christmas Wars. And like the Christmas Carols in the UU hymnal, your contribution in that war is disappointing.

I invite you to read my sermon, but I certainly don’t expect it. Still, I will highlight just a few points:

• First: The Christmas “tradition” we celebrate has evolved. If you go back only a few hundred years, Christmas meant drunken revelry in the street. If you go back even further, you will find that Christmas was -- using your words – “spiritual piracy” of existing pre-Christian holidays. Christmas as a religious and family celebration is only very recent, only about 200 years of the 2,000 years since the nativity of Jesus.

• Second. Unitarians and Universalists have made pivotal contributions to the tradition we celebrate as Christmas – including the tradition of placing children as central to the holiday. Unitarians and Universalists were early advocates for Christmas when many others wouldn’t touch it. From Christmas carols to Christmas trees to timeless stories, Unitarians have helped make this holiday what it is today. Our religious tradition, more than many others, has earned its place at the table!

• Third: All traditions are invented. All traditions are evolving. Unless you sing “Hark How All the Welkin Rings,” any protests against changing lyrics is a bit disingenuous. As for “Silent Night,” I don’t like the UU hymnbook changes either. But the familiar version is itself simply a “rewrite” (translation) of the original German, which even you probably don’t sing exclusively. But it is hardly fodder for the Spanish Inquisition! As you probably know, UUs will sing whatever they damn well please anyway, not what is put in front of them!

I’m not quite sure why you seem to feel threatened when someone celebrates Christmas differently from you. I’ve generally found that people who are secure in their beliefs aren’t upset by others’ opinions. Jefferson put it rather succinctly in his defense of religious liberty: “It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my legs."

And with this, I think, we approach the crux of the issue. Is Christmas really about traditions? Is it really about metaphysical formulas concerning the godhead? Or is it about Jesus and his teachings?

I believe what most of us found most offensive in your essay – aside from what felt like gratuitous sarcasm – was your claim of exclusivity. For you Jesus drew a circle that shuts people out, to use poet Edwin Markham’s metaphor. For us Jesus drew a circle that embraces everyone. What is most offensive is not the way you portray us, it is the way you portray Jesus and his meaning to us, empty of the message of love and goodwill that should be what is essential to Christmas.

As a Unitarian Universalist, I resist any attempt to take Jesus away from me. That can’t be done. Not the Jesus of history who taught us how to love and why to love; who showed us by example and by message the true meaning of compassion for our fellow human beings; who called us to be peacemakers, to be merciful, to be humble, to be forgiving; who called us in this way to be the salt of the earth.

This Jesus you and your club cannot take away from me. This Jesus is mine as legitimately as he is yours, and you cannot take him away and keep him to yourself.

And to the extent that these sacred teachings of Jesus are embedded in the Christmas tradition – and if you look beneath creed, they are there – then I claim Christmas as also mine, too. I do not intend to “buzz off.”

Mr. Keillor, you are invited to sing Unitarian carols: “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,” and for that matter, “Jingle Bells.” They’re there for you as well as us. Feel free to fiddle with the words until you can sing them with soul, so they express your beliefs with real integrity. We don’t mind. We’ll even throw in the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Even if it’s not a Christmas song, the author, Julia Ward Howe, a devout Unitarian, mentions the birth of Jesus.

And yes, help yourself to our Christmas Tree. Our pleasure. And feel free to write your own Christmas story, like so many great story-tellers have done, using the formula from our Dickens’ novella, “A Christmas Carol.” I’m sure you can spin a yarn from that basic story concept that will capture the spirit of the season. (You probably already have done so).

Most of all, though, we hope your Christmas will include the curious and glittering eyes of a child. We feel good about our efforts 200 years ago to help Christmas become a family holiday, and have children become central to its celebration. We hope there will be a child with you on Christmas morning, and you can join in feeling true joy of the holiday as the child’s face glows in seeing the lighted tree and presents and maybe even mysterious tracks in the snow. You don’t need to thank us, though, because that child’s face, and yo ur joy in seeing it, are really all the thanks we need.

And oh yes, we hope you find strength in the message of love and goodwill, delivered ages ago, by the one who admonished us to love our neighbors, and whose arms stretched out to embrace even “the least of these.”

Whatever you do, please don’t “Buzz Off.” Christmas is big enough for the both of us. That you enjoy it does me no harm. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my legs. On the contrary, it adds to the richness of the Christmas experience.

When I read your essay from last year, I thought about the little poem from Edwin Markham I referenced earlier. I’m sure you’re familiar with it and I feel awkward mentioning a poem to Mr. Writer’s Almanac. But I’m also reading this letter publically. So here it is:

“Outwitted” by Edwin Markham

He drew a circle that shut me out —
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in.

Tiny Tim drew a circle that included even old Mr. Scrooge, and then he famously said: “God Bless Us, Everyone!”

He’s talking to you, too, Mr. Keillor!

Sincerely yours,

The Rev. Bruce Clear, Minister

All Souls Unitarian Church

Indianapolis, Indiana

READING

[Some of you are aware of what I am about to read, but I’ll predict this will become somewhat of a shock to many here. The story-teller Garrison Keillor has been something of an icon to many of us Unitarians. So it came as something of a shock last year when the following essay appeared in the online magazine Salon.com. It was apparently written after Keillor visited the Unitarian Church of Cambridge, Massachusetts and was disturbed to find certain Christmas Carols re-written. I’ve thought about it for a year, knowing that eventually I would address it in a sermon. Here goes:

“DON”T MESS WITH CHRISTMAS”

by Garrison Keillor.

(“It’s a Christian Holiday, dammit, and it’s plain wrong to rewrite ‘Silent Night.’ Unitarians, I’m talking to you!”)

“. . . You can blame Ralph Waldo Emerson for the brazen foolishness of the elite. He preached here at the First Church of Cambridge, a Unitarian outfit (where I discovered that "Silent Night" has been cleverly rewritten to make it more about silence and night and not so much about God), and Emerson tossed off little bons mots that have been leading people astray ever since. "To be great is to be misunderstood," for example. This tiny gem of self-pity has given license to a million arrogant and unlovable people to imagine that their unpopularity somehow was proof of their greatness. . . .

“Unitarians listen to the Inner Voice and so they have no creed that they all stand up and recite in unison, and that's their perfect right, but it is wrong, wrong, wrong to rewrite "Silent Night." If you don't believe Jesus was God, OK, go write your own damn "Silent Night" and leave ours alone. This is spiritual piracy and cultural elitism and we Christians have stood for it long enough. And all those lousy holiday songs by Jewish guys that trash up the malls every year, Rudolph and the chestnuts and the rest of that dreck. Did one of our guys write "Grab your loafers, come along if you wanna, and we'll blow that shofar for Rosh Hashanah"? No, we didn't.

“Christmas is a Christian holiday -- if you're not in the club, then buzz off. Celebrate Yule instead or dance around in druid robes for the solstice. Go light a big log, go wassailing and falalaing until you fall down, eat figgy pudding until you puke, but don't mess with the Messiah.

“Christmas does not need any improvements.”

READING

From “The Battle for Christmas” by Stephen Nissenbaum

(Stephen Nissenbaum is a historian at University of Massachusetts, and this book, a history of Christmas, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. The first section traces the early history of the holiday, showing how it evolved into a kind of drunken anarchy day – so much so that Christmas became outlawed. I’m reading from the section which describes the turn-around into a family-centered religious holiday):

“With the turn of the nineteenth century, the re-appropriation of Christmas took on a concerted form – a move to hold church services on December 25. This move was led by both evangelicals and liberals. In the forefront of the evangelicals were the Universalists. Largely a rural sect, Universalists openly celebrated Christmas from the earliest stages of their existence in New England. The Universalist community in Boston held a special Christmas Day service in 1789, even before their congregation was officially organized, and in the early nineteenth century it was this denomination that proselytized for Christmas more actively than any other.

“The Unitarians were close behind. Compared with Universalists, Unitarians were more genteel, and (for all their theological liberalism) more socially conservative. And there were also more of them, especially in Boston. As a formal institution, the Unitarian movement was not organized until 1825. But by the early 1800s ministers who were inclined to doubt the trinity of the Godhead (and by implication, the divinity of Christ) had come to dominate the Congregational churches in Boston. In fact, for most of the first decade of the nineteenth century, not a single church within Boston’s town limits remained in Trinitarian hands. . .

“Unitarians were calling for the public observance of Christmas by about 1800. They did so in full knowledge that it was not a biblically sanctioned holiday, and that December 25 was probably not the day on which Jesus was born. They wished to celebrate the holiday not because God ordered them to do so but because they themselves wished to. And they celebrated it in the hope that their own observance might help to purge the holiday of its associations with seasonal excess and disorder.”

READING

“Outwitted” Edwin Markham

He drew a circle that shut me out —
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in.