Merry Christmas! (It's not an endangered expression)

We had a lively discussion at our last Session meeting about the words "Season's Greetings." One of our Presbyterian Women circles had hung a piece of poster board in the narthex for members to write Christmas greetings to one another. A few Session members thought it should be changed to "Merry Christmas."

They pointed out that a church, of all places, ought to be where people are perfectly comfortable using the word "Christmas."

I'm quite sure the PW member wrote "Season's Greetings" in all innocence. She could just as well have written "Merry Christmas." She had no idea she was stepping into the middle of an ongoing debate about the so-called "War on Christmas."

Is there such a "war?" I have my doubts. I think the whole concept of a War on Christmas is something TV pundits dreamed up in order to boost their ratings. Of course there are secular contexts, like department stores, that have to be mindful of their Hanukkah shoppers as well as their Christmas shoppers! Most reasonable people never thought this was a problem until some TV commentator told them it was.

A friend of mine, David Leininger, addressed this subject in a sermon circulated online. He says it better than I could, so I think I'll just let him speak for me:

It has always felt good for me to say [Merry Christmas]. And, to be honest, I never worried much about it. I have tried to be somewhat sensitive and not extend the wish to my Jewish or Muslim friends. That would have made no sense, but I have never felt particularly reluctant to say it. Have you?

What brings it to mind is this bizarre concern that some people have been supposedly feeling in recent years about being prevented from wishing folks, "Merry Christmas." Apparently, it all started when somebody on FOX News started a "Christmas Under Siege" campaign noting that many businesses were not wishing shoppers, "Merry Christmas" upon the completion of their transactions, but rather something innocuous and non-specific like, "Happy Holidays." The ultra-right wing John Birch Society said the same thing in the 1950s calling it a conspiracy concocted by the Godless United Nations. Not to be outdone, Focus on the Family's James Dobson started something called the Alliance Defense Fund running a project with the motto: "Merry Christmas. It's okay to say it." Jerry Falwell launched a "Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign," with promises to file suit against anyone who spread "misinformation" about how Christmas can be celebrated in schools and public spaces. He said he had 750 lawyers who were ready to pounce if, for example, a teacher were muzzled from leading the third graders in "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing." Of course, those 750 lawyers did not come cheap, so your tax-deductible contributions were most welcome to insure the success of this important venture.

One of the FOX News folks, John Gibson, even published a book called The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought. Huh? I am a liberal, and proud of it, but the only thing I have ever plotted at Christmas is how to survive without going into bankruptcy.

Truth is, America has a complicated history with Christmas, going back to the Puritans, who despised it and considered the celebration un-Christian. The concern that Christmas distracted from religious piety continued even after Puritans faded away. In 1827, an Episcopal bishop lamented that the devil had stolen Christmas "and converted it into a day of worldly festivity, shooting, and swearing." 

Christmas began to gain popularity when it was transformed into a domestic celebration, after the publication of Clement Clarke Moore's Visit from St. Nicholas and Thomas Nast's drawings in Harper's Weekly that created the image of a white-bearded Santa who gave gifts to children. The new emphasis lessened religious leaders' worries that the holiday would be given over to drinking and shooting and swearing, but it introduced another concern: commercialism. And, we have been battling that ever since, with a notable lack of success -- and to the great relief of the nation's retailers who do their best business of the year just prior to Christmas.

These days, the "defenders" of Christmas are not just tolerating commercialization -- they are insisting upon it. Shop at the places that will wish you, "Merry Christmas," not just, "Happy Holidays."

Enough already! Christmas is just getting caught in the political crossfire. We are living in an America that, I am convinced, is not nearly so divided as some folks who have been exploiting us want us to believe. The vast majority of us agree on the vast majority of issues -- social, political, theological, whatever. There are some fringe issues about which we might disagree, but so what? We do not have to agree on everything to successfully live and work together -- ask any husband or wife. My advice is simply this: do not get caught up in these controversies. They are not worth it, they serve no purpose except to those who are trying to exploit them and us, and they certainly do not reflect well on us as Christians.

All I want for Christmas this year is grace -- just grace. The story of Christmas is, after all, at its heart, a story of grace. The coming of Jesus Christ into our world is the affirmation of God's unmerited favor to us. Look again at that little New Testament "postcard" (it's hardly long enough to be called something as highfalutin as an "epistle") to Titus: "For the grace of God that brings salvation ... Jesus ... has appeared to all ..." (Titus 2:11). Grace -- the essence of Christmas.

For Hmmm... the Bell Tolls

We’ve changed our Good Friday practice at the church, in the last year or so.  Faced with dwindling attendance at the noon-to-three service we used to offer in conjunction with several other churches in the community, we finally gave up on that service and decided to hold one at seven p.m. in the evening, instead. Tonight we’re offering what we expect will be a simple but moving Taizé service, backed by the Chancel Choir, who are in the process of learning what contemplative chants are all about. We’ll see if perhaps we can start a new local tradition.

Because noon-to-three comprises the biblical hours of the crucifixion, this year we simply opened the church for prayer during those hours. It’s our last nod to the Good Friday afternoon worship tradition. I wasn’t in the Sanctuary the whole time, but to the best of my knowledge no one took advantage of the opportunity.

That’s not a huge surprise. The contemplative tradition feels foreign to many Presbyterians. We tend to be a pragmatic bunch — not the sort of crowd who flock to an opportunity to gather for silent prayer.

Besides, to a culture that increasingly worships youth and health with a zeal bordering on idolatry, the figure of a tortured man gasping out his last breath on a cross seems the antithesis of any sort of victory.

In past years, at three p.m., we would conclude the community service by ringing the church bell thirty-three times – symbolic of the years of Jesus’ life. Although the Sanctuary was empty, I went in there today anyway, took hold of the bell rope, and slowly rang it. Thirty-three times feels like an eternity, when you space the rings out with a few seconds in between each one.

Outside, through the stained-glass, I could hear the sound of traffic and glimpse the wraithlike shadows of passing cars: people on their way to who knows where, very likely oblivious to the tradition that three o’clock was the hour of Jesus’ death.

If they noticed the sounding of the bell at all, would they realize what it was about?

I’ve always found the ringing of church bells to be significant in ways beyond words. In the year of undergraduate study I spent in Oxford, I used to look forward to the time each Sunday evening when all the change-bell ringers from the parish churches and college chapels, by common agreement, simultaneously practiced their trade. It was a glorious cacophony I will never forget, a mellifluous, rippling series of sound waves washing over that city of spires.

In years past, church bells functioned as many towns’ public-notification system. Like the Emergency Broadcast System that interrupts radio and TV programming every once in a while for a test, church bells fulfilled that function in years gone by. Public joys, civic celebrations, urgent alarms: all were heralded by the ringing of the steeple bell. In the era before loudspeakers and sirens, it was pretty much the loudest, most sonorous thing around.

That function has long since been supplanted by electronic systems of various kinds. Our local volunteer-firehouse and first-aid sirens are way louder than any church bell in town. In the days following Hurricane Sandy, the local Office of Emergency Management sent out daily information bulletins via telephone robocall. A viral message on Facebook, as we all know, can reach millions in the space of a few hours, if its recipients are keen to propagate it through their slacktivist mouse-clicks.

All that made me feel like a bit of a dinosaur, yanking on that bell-rope thirty-three times in an empty sanctuary, beside a street filled with drivers on their way to who-knows-what sort of Easter holiday sale. (I’ve actually seen a few ads for Good Friday sales in recent years. Now there’s a sacrilegious cluelessness that beggars the imagination!)

American hyper-individualism has been on the rise for generations. Has it reached its spiritual apogee in today’s bland acceptance of “Have It Your Way” McReligion as the national creed?

“Cast off the ties that bound
Our hearts in Christian love:
The fellowship of kindred minds:
To that we give the shove.”

(I just came up with that. Inspired, or what?)

The bell-tone reverberates, over the parade of preoccupied passersby.  What can we do but sound it anyway, hopeful that, somewhere, someone looks up and displays a half-smile of recognition?

What's a Church's Economic Worth?

From time to time, we all hear complaints about certain benefits churches receive from the government - most notably, our exemption from property taxes and the income-tax deductions our members can receive for their contributions. Critics of these benefits tend to see churches as freeloaders, living high on the hog at the public's expense.

A recently-published research study, if its results are generally accepted, will go a long way towards putting such objections to rest.

The "Halo Effect" Study conducted by the non-profit group, Partners for Sacred Places, examined historic churches in Philadelphia. As reported in a February 1, 2011 story in the Philadelphia Inquirer, the positive economic impact of churches on their surrounding community - both in terms of direct spending and services provided cheaply or at no cost to their recipients - is massive:

"They added up the money generated by weddings and funerals, festivals, counseling programs, preschools, elder care. They tallied the salaries of staff and the wages of roofers, plumbers, even snow shovelers. They put dollar signs on intangibles, too, such as helping people find work and teaching children to be socially responsible.

They even measured the diameter of trees on church campuses.

The grand total for the 12 congregations: $50,577,098 in annual economic benefits.

The valuation for 300-member Gloria Dei (Old Swedes') Episcopal Church in Queen Village, for instance, was a middle-of-the-road $1.65 million. By contrast, the figure for Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary Roman Catholic parish in Kensington, with 7,000 congregants, a parochial school, and a community center, was $22.44 million.

The numbers, culled from clergy and staff interviews, 'just blew us away,' said Robert Jaeger, executive director of the research group Partners for Sacred Places."

The report has also been mentioned in a May 20, 2011 BBC News story.

As the article makes clear, there will certainly be challenges to some of the calculations included in the report. Pricing intangibles is always a tricky business, in some respects more of an art than a science.

Still and all, the Halo Effect report is a telling reminder that our communities would be poorer places without their churches.

A final note: the photo of the church steeple with the blue-neon halo hanging from it is not Photoshopped. It's the Oran Mor bar and nightclub in Glasgow, Scotland. It's located in a former Church of Scotland sanctuary that once belonged to the now-defunct Kelvinside Church.

Sometimes the message of a church's intangible positive benefits to the community just doesn't get out in time.

More on the Lord's Prayer

Who would have thought my little town of Point Pleasant Beach would be the site of a separation-of-church-and-state controversy? It's all about the Borough Council's desire to continue its practice of opening Council meetings with a public recitation of the Lord's Prayer.

An article in today's newspaper tells of the appearance of some local citizens who interrupted the Council's newly-instituted moment of silence by praying the Lord's Prayer aloud.

I've written this letter to the editor of the Asbury Park Press. We'll see if they publish it:

To the Editor:

Reading about the controversy here in Point Pleasant Beach about official use of the Lord’s Prayer in Borough Council meetings leads me to wonder: how did the Council choose the particular version they’re using?

Their “forgive us our trespasses” version – favored by Roman Catholics, Episcopalians, Methodists and others – comes from William Tyndale’s Bible translation of 1525. The “forgive us our debts” used in my own Presbyterian Church is based on John Wycliffe’s translation of 1395 as well as the King James Version. A 1988 ecumenical alternative seeks to foster Christian unity by introducing “forgive us our sins.”

No one ever wrote down the Aramaic words Jesus himself would have spoken, but of course, there’s always the original Greek of the New Testament. Somehow, though, “aphes humin ta opheilemata hemon” doesn’t have the same ring to it.

By beginning their meetings with an explicitly Christian prayer, the Council is already flouting the First Amendment’s prohibition on “establishment of religion.” I think we citizens have a right to know which expression of Christianity the Council has chosen to establish, and why.

Of course, the Council could avoid all this complexity by simply deciding to introduce a moment of silence instead. That would be truer to Jesus’ original intention in Matthew 6:5-15. Matthew says Jesus taught his disciples this simple prayer so they could use it in private – not ostentatiously, in public, for all to see. That seems to be what this regrettable political debate is all about, isn’t it?

What I Want from My Government

Lots of people are wanting things from the government these days. Some neighbors of mine in Point Pleasant Beach are wanting Borough Council meetings to convene with a unison recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, as they have for many years (a practice the ACLU is trying to stop, by means of a recent lawsuit). Speaking as the pastor of a local church, and as a seminary adjunct professor of church history, here’s what I want.

I want the Lord’s Prayer to be banned at public meetings. We’ll continue to recite it every Sunday in our church, with reverence. But, in Borough Hall? No way. Doesn’t belong there.

A couple weeks ago, I was reminded anew of why it doesn’t. I was teaching my seminary church history class about a nearly-forgotten figure from our nation’s past: a Presbyterian minister by the name of Francis Makemie.

In 1707, Lord Cornbury, Royal Governor of New York, threw Makemie into jail. His crime? “Preaching without a license.” And where had Makemie committed this heinous offense? On some street corner? Blocking pedestrians on the sidewalk, to wave religious tracts in their faces? No, it was at a worship gathering in the private home of some friends in New York City.

As the King’s agent in the Royal Colony of New York, Cornbury considered it his duty to promote the Church of England as the established, state-sanctioned religion. “Dissenters” – non-Anglicans – were permitted to gather for worship, but only as the Governor gave them leave to do so. Makemie – an energetic evangelist based in Maryland, who had established Presbyterian churches all over the Middle Atlantic colonies – had blown into town without first asking the Governor’s permission. (Makemie wasn’t forgetful; the omission was deliberate on his part.)

The problem was that Lord Cornbury was a little behind on his legal reading. He either didn’t know, or more likely didn’t care, that Parliament had approved an Act of Toleration eighteen years earlier. That law forbade discrimination against “dissenting” groups (those other than the two established state religions in the British Isles: Anglicanism in England and Presbyterianism in Scotland).

It’s a little hard for us to comprehend, but in that day the now-familiar idea of a religious denomination was brand-new. It all began with the Act of Toleration of 1689. Before then, it was winner-take-all in the religious wars. If your religious group ended up on top for a while (as Lord Cornbury’s Team Anglican did, in England), you were entitled to say to everyone else: “It’s our way or the highway.” In Scotland – which shared the same monarchs, King William and Queen Mary, with England – Makemie’s Presbyterianism prevailed. Whenever William and Mary crossed the border into Scotland, they became Presbyterians – as Queen Elizabeth still does, to this day. No British monarch had ever visited the far-off American colonies, so what spiritual transformation might take place here, in the event of a royal walkabout, was anybody’s guess.

Cornbury was attempting to establish the legal precedent that New York was an Anglican colony, and that – as the King’s agent – he was entitled to personally regulate all religious gatherings. Makemie, who argued before the court that his only license to preach came from God, had just spent 6 weeks in the slammer trying to prove otherwise.

Makemie had his day in court. He cited the Act of Toleration so convincingly that the judge – evidently a person of some considerable backbone, since the Governor was sitting right there – acquitted him.

So, what do I want from my government, three centuries later? What I want is for my government to zealously guard my First Amendment rights, and those of my church community, to practice our religion unhindered. That means – as the First Amendment unambiguously puts it – “no establishment of religion.” A moment of silence is fine, at the start of a Borough Council meeting, if that’s what people want. Yet, I would feel deeply ashamed of my community if our elected leaders were to continue to forget the principles my distinguished Presbyterian forbear, Mr. Makemie, defended for 6 weeks in a dank, New York City jail cell.