The Christmas story, whatever one does or does not believe, is a story of reversals. It’s a story of tipping things over to set things right. Yet it all seems so familiar that we forget how much it requires wild imagination. The starring actors a poor family, the grand setting a tiny backwater town, heavenly angels speaking only to the sketchy demographic of sheep herders, and at the heart of it: a Jewish bastard (or so it would seem) in the Roman empire whom foreign envoys call “king,” the God of the universe a naked baby. When you let yourself take it all in, well, it seems frighteningly relevant, (again) whatever one believes. I say frightening because no one really wants to embrace the unexpected, question assumptions, and allow that what is isn’t always what should be.Yet it’s time to do just that. I don’t mean to suggest that chaotic anarchy is the answer. Not at all. But a cold hard look at what is love, what is justice, what is our place in the world, adopting a compassion so severe that we have to laugh,… and then to lighten up and change accordingly. Terrifying and exulting. Imagine.
