Between No Longer and Not Yet

In talking about the last week of the year, a friend mused, “We’ve entered that time between Christmas and New Year’s Day, where you don’t know what day it is, who you are, or what you’re supposed to be doing.” How right she is.

As an active Salvation Army officer, I loved the days nestled between Christmas Day and New Year’s Day. With a very full November and December schedule, we generally took a few days of vacation to unwind, sometimes traveling but more often spending time at home. While there were still plenty of tasks to be accomplished (laundry comes to mind), my calendar squares were blank, and those “in between” days offered space for novel-reading and Law and Order marathons, the only time of year when I watched hours of Olivia and Elliot without guilt. 

Traditionally, Americans have used the days between December 24 and January 2 to connect with family and to refuel in preparation for a new year. While I’ve been jotting down dates in the back of my 2017 calendar for a few weeks, I’ve used this week to crack open my new hot pink calendar (a gift from the hubby) so I can sort out my schedule for the next few months. As a borderline techie, I’m still not ready to give up my physical calendar for the convenience of storing my life on my phone, and I find pleasure in seeing the blank pages, awaiting the unfolding possibilities of 2018.

Historically, the beginning of a new year has been celebrated for 4000 years. The Babylonians used the first new moon following the vernal equinox to mark their new year with Akitu, a ritual occurrence over a period of eleven days. In 46 B.C., Julius Caesar introduced the Julian calendar, beginning with January 1, and adding ninety extra days to make the numbers work. In medieval times, attempts were made to change the date of the new year to more religious ones, such as December 25 and March 25 (the Feast of the Annunciation), but in 1582, Pope Gregory XII claimed January 1 as New Year’s Day once again.

Much of our contemporary celebration centers around midnight on New Year’s Eve. Those of us of a certain age miss bandleader Guy Lombardo’s rendition of Auld Lang Syne, along with long-time New Year’s Eve host Dick Clark, but we still look forward to the ball drop at Times Square as the clock strikes twelve. Unless, of course, we live in Dillsburg, PA, where residents gather to watch a six-foot-tall pickle drop from the fire department’s ladder truck – destination, a pickle barrel.

Not to be outdone by the pickle-droppers, the good folk of Tallapoosa, GA (formerly Possum Snout, GA), use a possum drop to bring in the new year. Fortunately, the curly-tailed marsupial is stuffed, not live. I wonder if Ashland is missing out on something here. An iconic pickle, the Tallapoosa possum, the appearance of Punxsutawney Phil on Groundhog Day, and Hinckley, Ohio’s buzzards – these crowd favorites do wonders for tourism. Time to put on your thinking caps, Ashlanders.

Pickles and possums aside, the in-between space of transition prepares us for the new year as we contemplate my friend’s words: Who am I? What day is it? What am I supposed to be doing? It’s a perfect time for resolutions, even if 80% will be laid to rest by February.

Days of transition from one year to the next can also open us to liminal space, from the Latin word “threshold.” Franciscan Richard Rohr suggests we “allow ourselves to be drawn out of ‘business as usual’ and remain patiently on the threshold, where we are betwixt and between the familiar and the completely unknown . . . this is the sacred space where the old world is able to fall apart, and the bigger world is revealed.” Liminality allows us, as Nancy Levin suggests, to “honor the space between no longer and not yet.”

My New Year’s wish is that beyond the revelry of dropping balls, pickles and possums, and the discomfort of pork and sauerkraut-induced indigestion, you might discover the transformative liminal space offered by these days of waiting. Happy New Year!

O Tannebaum

It was a typical Christmas photo, much like those that flood our social media feeds this time of year: carefully wrapped presents and colorful gift bags sat neatly beneath the branches of an artificial evergreen tree in preparation for a Christmas party. The tree itself looked rather bare in comparison to the tinsel-laden tree in “It’s a Wonderful Life,” or the glorious thirty-foot tree at the mall, but the accompanying text unveiled its exceptional beauty in the telling of the tree’s back story.

It began on September 6 of this year, when hurricane Irma swept through the U.S. Virgin Islands. Her sister hurricane, Maria, made her own destructive visit that same month, and in their aftermath, there would be no tree, no decorations, no advent wreath for the small Salvation Army worship center. All were swept away, ruined by the hurricane’s devastating force.

Resigned to the post-Irma “new normal,” Captain Christa Bryan walked into the chapel on this past Sunday morning to finish preparations for their Christmas party. She was astonished to see a tree, standing tall, dressed lovingly with a dozen red and silver balls, a strand of lights, and one simple ornament, a mother dressed in colorful African garb, cradling a baby. Unbeknownst to the young pastors, one of their church members (who also serves as their caseworker) had snuck into the building late Saturday night, set up her own Christmas tree, finished wrapping the presents, and blessed the weary congregation with a Christmas they will always hold dear in their memories.

As I gazed at the picture of this tree as Larry drove us to Sunday worship, I was touched deeply by this story of blessing and sacrifice. While I’m not on the “a color-coordinated tree in every room” bandwagon, I still carefully unwrap the priceless (to us) ornaments each year, even the macaroni and glitter masterpieces our sons created so many years ago. I can barely imagine what it would be like to lose those memories in an instant of devastation, and then months later, be painfully reminded of that loss when it came time to decorate for Christmas.

But rather than allowing the absence of a tree to symbolize the loss this congregation faced, both individually and corporately, the caseworker redeemed the narrative through her own sacrificial gift. Hundreds of miles away, I read of her selfless action and could feel her arms stretching around her church, her people. An unexpected, extravagant gift.

And that is the story of Christmas. In the book of Ephesians, Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of the Bible describes the coming of Jesus to the world: “. . . immense in mercy and with an incredible love, he [the Father] embraced us.” Or as I sang as a child in the Quempas Carol, “God’s own son is born a child, is born a child. God the Father is reconciled, is reconciled.”

I was also struck by the presence of the one unique ornament in the center of the tree. There she was, a Madonna, a young woman in the native dress of the people of the U.S. Virgin Islands, waiting alone with a baby in her arms. The aloneness is a part of the nativity narrative we sometimes ignore. In our pageant depictions of the manger scene, there’s generally a full house in the inn that initially had no room for a laboring mother and an anxious father-to-be. Yet even though Joseph was by her side, the cattle were lowing, and the little drummer boy was on his way, Mary was alone in her astonishment, in her labor, in her birthing, and in her supernatural connection with the God of the universe, just as we, male and female, stand alone in our interaction with the divine. And yet, I was reminded again of Mary’s response to her aloneness, to the challenge before her: “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.”

As the Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry) understands, “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” Might you discover your own holy moment of insight as you look beyond what the eye initially sees. Merry Christmas.

The Goose is Getting Fat

I recently attended the holiday concert starring our second-grade granddaughter, the lovely Madelyn Simone, along with two hundred of her best friends from second and fifth grade. The children sang with both enthusiasm and skill, and their repertoire even included the arrangement of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” by the Boss himself, Bruce Springsteen, complete with choreography.

At the conclusion of the musical program, the children made presentations to the charities they supported this year. The fifth grade raised dollars for Pegasus Farms, a therapeutic equestrian program, and younger children supported the Saint Baldrick Foundation, which funds children’s cancer research. Not only did the school raise over $5000 for their designated projects, but one of the students announced that he’ll soon be shaving his head in support of the St. Baldrick project. That’s commitment.

Experts say that about 18% of all charitable giving is made in December, driven in part by “the holiday spirit,” as well as by the desire of some donors to make a last-minute tax-deductible gift. Inspired in part by the gift-giving of the Magi in the nativity narrative, people of faith often ask themselves the question that Christina Rossetti posed in her nineteenth-century poem, “In the Bleak Midwinter.” “What shall I give him [Jesus], poor as I am, what shall I give him, child that I am?” One answer to that question is by making a gift to someone who is “less fortunate” than the donor, immortalized by the gift Scrooge makes to Tiny Tim’s family in Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol.”

This seasonal gift-giving practice was even a part of a children’s nursery rhyme. “Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat. Please put a penny in the old man’s hat.” A second rhyme, a more obscure one that I’ve fondly re-named “The Kettle Worker Song,” urges a donation to the shivering poor with these memorable words: “Hold, men, hold, we are very cold. Inside and outside, we are very cold. If you don’t give us silver, then give us gold . . .“

The Salvation Army has traditionally rung its shiny bell during the Christmas season, calling its hearers to contribute their loose change and dollar bills to the beckoning kettle. Its pleading voice is echoed in a vast range of charitable choices. I remember the colorful Christmas Seals that we’d add to our cards, indicative of our family’s donation to the American Lung Association. My childhood church sponsored a White Christmas drive, when we’d bring gifts so Miss Mager could deliver them to a poor community in Appalachia.

One creative fund-raising opportunity is a Polar Bear Dip and Dash. A classic one is held in Portland, Maine, where participants are urged to “be bold in the cold” with a 5k and subsequent plunge into the icy Atlantic Ocean on December 31^st to raise funds to combat climate change. That’s taking the “we are very cold” poem to another level. My neighbor Kaitlynn is raising funds this month to combat human trafficking by wearing a dress every day during Dressember, “embracing the freedom that I’m allowed, on behalf of those who aren’t free to live vibrant, autonomous lives.” Hers is a chilly choice as well.

With all the charitable choices that beckon us in December, we must not forget that our community is in the final days of its 2018 United Way campaign. Delivering a frozen turkey to a poor family on Christmas Eve might sound like a good idea, but those with inadequate resources need more comprehensive support throughout the year, and that’s what Ashland County’s United Way partner agencies provide every day of the year.

As the sacred word reminds us, “It is more blessed to give than receive.” When our own “goose is getting fat,” we have the ability to bless others with our charitable giving. Many of us have the luxury to write a check as we sit in front of the fireplace, but some of our neighbors still shiver in the cold of poverty, illness, and despair. As we are both generous and wise in our giving, we can make a difference, even on days like today when “baby, it’s cold outside.”