At this magical time of year, it seems the world slows its roll for a few hours as we open our hearts to the joys of the season. Small children scan the sky anxiously for Santa and listen for reindeer on the roof. Our homes are brilliant with the multi-coloured lights of the season and strangers wish each other a Merry Christmas.
Yes, wars continue around the globe. Historically, though, this is a time of miracles. In 1914, at the beginning of the First World War, British troops heard their German counterparts singing Christmas carols in trenches across from them. They saw lanterns and small fir trees and joined in the singing. The next day, they organized a soccer match in no man’s land. They celebrated as human beings, not as combatants.
For a brief moment, war was forgotten, replaced by a rare camaraderie that recognized the common humanity of those who fought on opposing sides in that conflict. Even in wartime, people of faith found a way to celebrate Christ’s birth.
As we reflect on the eternal message of Christmas, we do so in a world turned upside down. Jesus was born in Bethlehem, a town in what’s now the West Bank. No, the person Christians worship as the Prince of Peace was not a Palestinian, as some now claim. He was definitively and unabashedly a Jew.
Ironically, few pilgrims dare visit Bethlehem this year. The soundtrack in Manger Square isn’t one of carols full of joy and wonder. It’s that of an age-old hatred. Only Israel protects the right of Christians to worship at their sacred sites.
The hope that somehow the 2,000-year-old message of peace that the season brings will break through the war clouds of divisiveness seems naive. Yet we have faith.
Israeli hostages must be returned. Young people, whose only sin was to celebrate life with music, paid for it with their lives or their freedom. Surely, if a Christmas truce can happen on the battlefields of the First World War, there’s enough goodwill today to reach across the no man’s land that is the hardened hearts of Hamas and return the surviving hostages to their families.
Meanwhile, at this time of peace and goodwill, we wish you all a very Merry Christmas.