A Few Poorly-Organized Thoughts At The Start Of A New Year

A few days before Christmas, as I was dropping a few things off at the post office, I held the door open for a woman wheeling in a hand truck full of packages. “Thanks,” she said. “You have a lot of friends” I noted, referring to her load. “Troops” She said, “They’re for the troops. One of them is my son.” I honestly don’t remember what I said to her after that, but I’m sure it was stupid, and in any case it concluded our conversation. We both took our places in line, before the post office clerk said to her “Ma’am, just step right up. You don’t have to wait in line with the second trip.” By that point, the few outgoing packages and bills for work I was there to send seemed to be the most trivial things in the world, which, to be fair, they probably were. That brief exchange has returned to my mind several times as Christmas slipped by and the New Year has already begun to pass by. Perhaps what struck me about it was merely the reminder that our country is at war, and has been in some way or other for more than five years. Perhaps it’s a testament to modern warfare (or perhaps merely to the nature of the conflicts themselves) that the human cost to the U.S. has been sufficiently low that the war hasn’t hit home for (I suspect) the majority of us. Regardless of what you think of the war (and most of us hold at least one strong opinion about it), I have to admit for myself that I don’t think of it often. It’s become that thing which I change the radio station to avoid hearing about, and casually pass over the newspaper headlines that refer to it. Perhaps it isn’t as bad as all that: there’s very little if anything which I can personally do one way or the other about the war, and all that the press dishes out is politicized sound bites and dehumanizing if not misleading statistics. Still, I can’t help but wonder if we’re not all too numb in some way or other about being engaged in something as terrible as war is. I’m not trying to get political here, or make some broad statement regarding what I think everyone else ought to do (a handy working definition of the word politics). I guess I’m just saying that it was helpful to me in some way to be reminded of the soldiers who were not able to come home for Christmas, and those (hopefully few) who never will, and to pray for them and their families. I suppose that’s all I can do. Celebrations of the Incarnation were many and joyful this year (and actually have yet to conclude), and I’m always amazed at the blessing my family and friends are to me, and at the joy I receive through them. Gifts were given and generally well-received, and I believe that I may have survived another Christmas without my lack of gift-giving prowess costing me any relationships, although it may be too early to tell. It seems that every Christmas I suddenly realize that I’ve let Advent pass without taking advantage of this time that the Church gives us to meditate on the coming of Christ and to make way for His coming in our hearts, and I’d be lying if I said this year was much of an exception. It seems that I never cease to disappoint myself, and yet Christ never ceases to be merciful, and for that I can only be thankful. That said, I found myself presented with at least some time just before Christmas where I was compelled by some combination of circumstances to do just what I’d been putting off doing, and felt particularly drawn to the canticles of Zechariah and of Our Lady, rejoicing in God’s faithfulness to His covenant and His people, and in the way in which God makes himself known. I’m as pleased with sweets and Christmas trees and egg nog and hectic reunions with family and out-of-town friends as anyone else, and perhaps more so, but I’m afraid that too often I content myself with the “warm fuzzies” of the Christmas season. Of course we all know that Christmas isn’t really about these things, but I have to admit that a large portion of my enjoyment of the season is wrapped up in them. In any case, there was no light bulb going off over my head, where I suddenly opened the windows to my house and ordered some boy on the street to go buy a huge bird for the Cratchet family, but I was reminded of what Mary and Zechariah were so joyous about, that humanity and the earth were forever changed and glorified by the Incarnation of God as a Man. Christmas isn’t just “not about” desserts and family and presents, its custom-made for the downtrodden, friendless, miserable wretches of the earth, which to some extent we all are. In any case I’m rambling, and I imagine that you’ve better things to do than this, so I’ll bid you a happy New Year, and leave it at that. Thanks for a great year, and hopefully more to come.