Merry Christmas to all

A confession: Christmas is not my favorite holiday. Yes, I know, I'm not alone in that.

As a secular holiday, the great American consumption fest is, well, sort of gross. Do we really need all this stuff? I know, I'm lucky to have been able to embrace the gospel of "Enough." I buy things to delight myself, so my feelings are a little hypocritical. But there it is.

The 90% celebrating Christmas contrasts with the 68% of Americans who report identifying with a Christian faith, indicating other faiths partake in the holiday. Gallup

As a religious holiday, I get Christmas, sort of. Embracing the holiday as the birth of the Christ child, the eruption of Godself into the humanity, requires the ability to swim comfortably within myth. Myth is important to humans, but not my best mode. I do better floating within consciousness of horrible, terrible, grace-filled, good, and all-too-human realities. Yes, that's Holy Week and Easter.

The Rev. Elizabeth Kaeton offers this for Christmas which captures a bit of how I apprehend the holiday:

Emmanuel means God with us. Think about that for a minute. It really does help to put things into better perspective.

Christmas is about being in the consciousness of where Christ is in life and where he is not.

The question of Christmas is not what to buy for whom or what you might get for Christmas. The question of Christmas is where Christ is and where Christ is not in your life.

And note, please, that now, we are talking about Christ, not Jesus, per se. We are talking about the spirit of the Resurrected Jesus, which is The Messiah, the Christ.

Let's all enjoy this time in our own ways.