Northern State Universitya talk by Jon Schaff, a man about town
The best thing about the coming of Thanksgiving for me, besides the in take of gravy that you get on Thanksgiving, is that after Thanksgiving you get to listen to Christmas music with impunity. I confess to listening to Christmas music 12 months of the year, but for the next four weeks I can listen to it without getting strange looks from people. Now in the glorious new age of internet music piracy I have made myself two awesome all purpose Christmas music CDs. I have one of secular songs, like White Christmas and Rudolph and all that. I have another one with religious songs, my favorite song being the one I just listened to. I am pretty old school when it comes to, well, just about everything, but especially when it comes to Christmas music. No NSYNCH dancin’ Christmas for me, although I will say that Jewel’s Christmas album from a couple years ago has some spectacular cuts which have made their way onto my all purpose religious Christmas CD. But I generally prefer the old standbys: Bing Crosby, Andy Williams, Perry Como. It’s funny what we remember. I can’t remember much about Christmases as a kid. I hardly remember a single present I got. I remember being excited Christmas Eve, and we’ve always been a Christmas eve mass family. I remember the one year we went to real Christmas Eve midnight mass, and I was all excited because I had never been allowed to stay up so late. I remember we weren’t allowed to get up on Christmas morning until my dad got us up. And I remember Johnny Mathis. How sad is that. My most vivid memory of childhood Christmases is of Johnny Mathis singing Sleigh Ride. I think we can learn a lot from Christmas songs. For instance we get such useful information as Santa actually makes a list and checks it twice, and he knows when you are sleeping and he knows when your awake. Most importantly he knows if you’ve been bad or good, so be good for goodness sake. And Christmas songs actually give you the content of what it is to be good. Take one of my very favorite songs, The Little Drummer Boy. Perry Como has the best version incidentally. Who is this little drummer boy? And where on Earth did he get a drum? Well he goes to see the baby Jesus, “a newborn king,” as the song goes. And what do you give a king? Well a tribute of course. But he has nothing to give. He’s worried because he knows that he’s in the presence of the Lord, and here he is some dirty little drummer boy and he has nothing to give. Everyone else has “their finest gifts to bring” and all he has is his drum. But the song takes an interesting turn. “Little baby, pa rump pa pa pum. I am a poor boy too, pa rump pa pa pum.” That’s a pretty pregnant word there. Too. I am a poor boy…too. I thought he was coming to see a king. But the king is a poor boy too? How can that be? And so the drummer boy offers the one thing he has. “Shall I play for you, on my drum.” And Mary nods yes. And he plays. And he plays his best for Him. I know that this is an apocryphal story. The wise men are actually in the scripture. They bring him these finest gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. But this Little Drummer Boy I think offers a great juxtaposition to the wise men. The wise men, we three kings is the song, show that even greatness is humbled before Christ. This drummer boy shows us that the poor are ennobled by the Christ child. All the drummer boy brings is a little tune played on a drum. According to the song, the baby Jesus smiles at the Little Drummer Boy. “Then he smiled at me, me and my drum.” This is a boy with no name. No possessions seemingly. Mary and Joseph were honored by the wise men, but the baby Jesus smiles at the Little Drummer boy. Just like in the Sermon on the Mount, the meek and poor are the blessed ones.
Think of why Mary and Joseph were in oh little town of Bethlehem in the first place. Jewel has a fantastic version of Oh little Town of Bethlehem, by the way. Augustus Caesar had ordered a census of all the Roman Empire. I would imagine that of all the people counted in this census, Jesus was the least of them all. He was literally born in a barn, under dubious parentage. Years later it was probably Augustus on the coin when Christ said, “Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and unto God that which is God’s.” Augustus Caesar, who demanded that his subjects worship him as a god. All for the greater glory of Augustus. Christ asked that we worship him, and we just got done celebrating the feast of Christ the King, he asks us not to pay him tribute in gold or in fawning praise, but by serving, and suffering. To submitting ourselves to the service of him and of our neighbors. In short we are called to love. Many manifestations of love are in the end selfish. But not Christian love. The Greek word in scripture is agape, which is, I think, more accurately translated as charity. To give of one’s self, not for any gain, but simply out of a sense of service and duty.
Although there are plenty of songs to Mary, I think there needs to be
more Christmas songs for her. There
is that Amy Grant “Breath of Heaven” song, but “Mary’s Boy Child,”
sung by Harry Belefonte, is a much better song, albeit not directly about Mary.
When told that she would bear the Christ Child, her simple reply was,
“Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.”
Perfect submission to God’s will.
The thing about Advent is that it reminds us of the love God had for us
that he sent his only son to us, and that he will come again. The word advent means “coming” or “arrival.”
While we are preparing to celebrate the first coming of Christ, advent is
designed to direct our thoughts to the second coming of Christ.
Thus advent is a season filled with both joy and penance.
Joy, because we celebrate the incarnation of the Lord; penance because we
need to be prepared for when he comes again. It is funny what we remember.
I have heard who knows how many homilies in my life but there only a
couple that really stick in my mind. I
remember one from when I was maybe 11 years old back in my old parish of St.
Bridget just outside of Rochester MN. The
reading was one similar to the one we had this past week about beware, I come
like a thief in the night, and I come when you least expect it.
And good old Fr. Sheehan ended his homily with, “And when do you least
expect it.” I remember thinking,
well when do I least expect it. I had always thought the second coming was something that
would happen way out there. Not in my lifetime to be sure. When did I least expect it? Well, now. And I got really scared.
And it has been ever since then that I have really had the stereotypical
Catholic guilt. Advent reminds us
to prepare for the Lord. But not
because he is coming in four weeks, a hundred years, or sometime next
millennium, but because he is here now. On
that other major feast day, Easter, Christ conquered death. That’s why our faith is alive.
As Malcolm Muggeridge puts it, “Either Jesus never was, or he still is.
As a typical product of these confused times, with a skeptical mind and a
sensual disposition, diffidently and unworthily, but with the utmost sincerity,
I assert that he still is. If the
story of Jesus has ended on Golgatha, it would indeed be of a Man who dies, but
as two thousand years later the man’s promise that where two or three are
gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them, manifestly holds, it is
actually the story of a man who lives.”
There is even a Christmas song on this message. Again, the Harry Belefonte version is best. It is a tune put to the words of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:
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.
I thought how as the day had come
The belfries of all Christendom
Had roll'd along th' unbroken song
Of Peace on earth, good will to men.
And in despair, I bow'd 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
Emmanuel, as in “Oh Come, Oh
Come Emmanuel,” means God is with us. HE
is not a God of the past or the future, but a God of now.
This makes that song somewhat ironic because we are asking for the coming
of a God who is already here. What
makes us blessed in the Catholic Church is that we encounter this presence of
Christ every time we celebrate the Eucharist.
I have a buddy who is married to an Italian girl from New Castle, PA. He likes going to mass in his wife’s hometown with all the
old Italians. HE tells me that they all leave after Communion.
He says he likes this because it shows that these old Italians know what
mass is about. It is not about
social organizing, although that is fine. It
is about receiving Christ in the Eucharist.
Advent reminds us that every day God is With us.
Every day we should be preparing to be called, because he will come like
a thief in the night. When I was in
high school Fr. Jack Krough told is in theology class that you can sum up the
gospel in 10 words: Reform your lives, the kingdom of God is at hand.”
The kingdom is at hand, the question is whether each of us has properly
humbled himself to the service of Christ which will make us worthy of sharing in
eternal life. When I contemplate my
own life I think of what Thomas Jefferson wrote when worrying over slavery in
the United States, “I tremble at the thought that God is just.”
Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.
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