“ CHRISTMAS STORY – 2016 “
Once again we arrive at the month of December and sadly enough discover the repeated call of divers groups to dismantle the Story of Christmas and any associated considerations which maybe discovered supporting it. Many large stores have also altered their window themes in order to comply with the thrust of such groups and once again this has led to confusion and concern in the minds of the kindergarten level.
When a major Church group also succumbs to such a diversity of opinion one wonders then where has the real consideration and fact finding of Christmas gone. The newspapers, sadly, have also taken a moderate approach to erasing in one form or another this ongoing erasure program . This year, fewer than previously even, the Man in the Red Suit and his Ho, Ho, Ho’s is only discovered in the Malls making money.
On several occasions we drew attention to numbers of stories depicting the true Spirit of Christmas. Such were in the main encapsulated in the ‘Letter to Virginia Hanlon’, an 8 year old, by the Editor of the New York Sun informing her, “Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus!” Such versions underpin the magic, love and mystery surrounding the Story of the Child born in a Stable in Jerusalem over 2,000 years ago.
In the light of those statements listed I thought it might be of some merit to retrace another thought provoking time when the Story of Christmas was penned by Charles Dickens. The wise pundits think they know a thing or two about it and suggest a season of merry making and good cheer was invented by Washington Irving and Charles Dickens, the first conceiving the idea and the second through the infectiousness of his stories, giving it currency. One is not to believe a word of this.
Christmas is as old as the hills, it is as ancient as God. Like the stars that glitter above its frosty skies it has never had a beginning and can have no end. It had its origin in time when the first man felt a glow of gladness to see the sun turn in his tracks at mid-winter toward warmth again; toward spring, when the animals would awake in their dens, and green spread along the hills.
But its true origin, lying outside of time, was in the heart of man himself, so that under one form or another it has always existed, and always will.
It is a voice coming through the wintry darkness, like the quick golden cry of the trumpets, to tell us that the gods of light are neither dead nor sleeping; it is an angel in the tomb announcing Easter days.
What was to become the best loved Christmas Story in the English language was penned by Charles Dickens in 1843 and published in London on December 19th of that year. Although classified as a novella, it is in reality a powerful morality play. As such it has been staged and filmed countless times. The quintessential filmed version starred Alistair Sim as Ebenezer Scrooge (1951).
At the outset, Scrooge is portrayed as a cold-hearted, self centred shrewd and demanding money-lender who despised the frivolity of Christmas. “Bah, humbug!”. And is this not the model of those words being cast upon our portrait leading to Christmas 2016 once again. Those minds and actions must be repelled. The Story of Christmas is enshrined in the final words to Virginia, “No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.”
I heard the bells on Christmas Day There old familiar carols play, And wild and sweet
The words repeat Of peace on earth, good-will to men.
MERRY CHRISTMAS === WILLIAM
Comment
Surely the message here is that there are always dark moments in our lives (Winter Solstice) when everyone is looking for The Light be it a Warm Fire; A Good Meal; and most especially Spring. Freemasonry is full of such Symbolism and the message generally translates to the Universality of Man.
God Bless Norm