My upbringing wasn’t exactly traditional, especially come December. My Dad is (if I may say so) the expert on Christmas. He received his Ph.D. in History from King’s College, London, and is the author of Christmas in the Crosshairs, Santa Claus: A Biography, and The World Encyclopedia of Christmas. He has published works on topics ranging from Renaissance…
Zach helped me light the first candle of Advent on Sunday. The Advent Wreath is a tradition created by a German pastor in the 19th century as a way to teach kids about the coming of Christ. Candles are lit on the Sundays of Advent; three are purple for penitence, a fourth is pink for joy,…
Advent is preparation for the great inversion: God coming to Earth in the form of a human baby; the ruler of the cosmos trapped in a squalling package of helpless flesh. But this Christmas, it’s not enough.
One of my favorite things about Christmas parties was that they helped me say something a little louder than usual: that I was so effing glad to be alive. Hope springs up in the gloom. Not everything is lost. Even if every horrible thing about empire and injustice and cancer cells is true, a little baby is still about to be born who will crack open the world.
The season of joy and cheer runs on two things: sugar and torture. We cram as much as possible into days that sprint by. When you are in the season of terrible, you hold on to every second.
We might not all achieve ram-a-stranger’s-car-into-a-pole stress levels, but holidays have a way of making us feel frantic. Let’s take a minute to realize that we are entering what the church deems Pretty Special Time (PST, sometimes confused with Pacific Standard Time.) CHRISTMAS IS COMING, people. Everyone get ready!
