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Saturday the 24th of December 2005

1:51 PM (1713 days, 12h, 16min ago)

The Wrong Shall Fail, the Right Prevail

On one Christmas during the American Civil War, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow penned the following lines, lines which have echoed through the years and found resonance most particularly in the hearts of Americans living through times of war:

I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Till ringing, singing on its way
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Then from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
And with the sound the carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
And made forlorn, the households born
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And in despair I bowed my head
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.”


I hope Longfellow is right. He may yet be. I've been studying history for a pretty long time now, and it's hard not to notice that war seems to keep coming back to us. It somehow seems to me that we're further than we ever were from the failure of wrong and the truimph of good. We humans are such flawed beings.

But I think maybe that's what Longfellow was getting at - we are deeply flawed and, yet, as long as we still celebrate Christmas, there's still hope for us. I was thinking about this as I went about finishing my Christmas shopping, when I noticed some impatient motorists tailgating one another at the entrance to the mall. They were shooting angry glares at each other as they turned off in separate directions in the parking lot. "I'm trying to make Christmas perfect for my family, and how dare that person be in my way!" I could feel the hateful vibes rolling off them. "There is no peace on Earth," I said. How does Christmas give us reason for hope?

Christmas celebrates the intersection of the divine ideal and the earthly reality in the form of Christ on Earth. Christmas reminds us that, deeply flawed though we as humans most certainly are, our Creater, whoever or whatever He or She or They may be, loves us dearly and unconditionally, and loves us enough to walk among us and experience our pain and our joy.

The spirit of Christmas comes from the recognition that all our human brothers and sisters are as deeply flawed as we ourselves are. When we remember, at Christmas, that the reason people make mistakes is because they are imperfect, then we can react with sympathy instead of anger and frustration. The spirit of Christmas is the spirit of forgiveness, of sharing pain and joy, of loving unconditionally our fellow human being, regardless of whether they look like we do, or think like we do, or live like we do, or dream like we do, or believe like we do. When we catch that spirit, then we truly do make contact with the divine. There we find grace, and in grace, hope.

Most of us think of Christmas as a special time for family, for friends, for church  -- and so it should be. But the true Christmas spirit doesn't draw boundaries around groups based on ties of blood or friendship or belief. The true Christmas spirit, originating in our recognition that we all fall short of the ideal, is of peace on the whole of the Earth, and good will toward all of humankind. In the true Christmas spirit, we shower our loving kindness on strangers as well as friends, on people with whom we share our community, nation, and planet, as well as on people with whom we share the bonds of blood and domesticity, on people who receive the message that the divine and the human co-exist in this Universe through the Koran, or the Torah, or the Sayings of the Buddha, or the Tao Te Ching, or the Bhagavad Gita, or in some other story of faith as well as on those who recieve that message from the Christian Bible and the story of a cold night somewhere in time and space when a fair maiden laid a divine and helpless babe in the humble manger of a lowly stable.

The message and meaning of that story were powerfully framed by a French poet in the early nineteenth century, Placide Cappeau, whose words were later adapted into the beloved carol, "O Holy Night", which, when sung by a voice with a touch of the divine, moves Christians to tears. Look at the message it contains:
Oh holy night! The stars are brightly shining,
It is the night of the dear Savior's birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining,
Till he appear'd and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.
Fall on your knees! Oh, hear the angel voices!
Oh night divine, Oh night when Christ was born;
Oh night divine, Oh night divine.
Led by the light of Faith serenely beaming,
With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand.
So led by light of a star sweetly gleaming,
Here come the wise men from Orient land.
The King of Kings lay thus in lowly manger;
In all our trials born to be our friend.
He knows our need, our weakness is no stranger,
Behold your King! Before him lowly bend!
Behold your King, Behold your King.
Truly He taught us to love one another;
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains shall He break for the slave is our brother;
And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
Let all within us praise His holy name.
Christ is the Lord! O praise His Name forever,
His power and glory evermore proclaim.
His power and glory evermore proclaim.
Have a loving Christmas, everyone. May you all feel that touch of grace in the still and holy moment when human imperfection encounters the divine.

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