Joy to the World
TS Eliot was wrong. December is the cruelest month.
Christmastime is a magical time of light, warmth, hope, love. And of course, music. Some of the most lovely and touching music ever written was inspired by this special time.
Christmastime is like a glass ball you hold in your hand, the kind with a peaceful, idealized snow scene inside. When you shake it, snow falls on the cozy, cheerful houses ablaze with light, Silent Night begins to play, and for just a few moments, you are enchanted.
But it's an illusion. Just like Christmas is an illusion.
In those few moments we spend each year inside that glittering glass ball of Christmas, celebrating that night divine when Christ was born, the joyous music of the Christmas season, singing of peace, love, and redemption, reminds us how little the real America, Christian America, resembles a true Christian nation. Consider:
A Christian nation does not cut aid to the poor to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy.
A Christian nation would not tolerate a health insurance system that excludes 45 million souls.
A Christian nation does not murder its citizens.
A Christian nation could not possibly punish innocent men, women, and children, for over forty years, because they happen to live in a country whose politics we find unacceptable.
A Christian nation would never contribute to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of children in a foreign land, and then excuse it by claiming, "We think the price is worth it."
A Christian nation would not send its good Christian soldiers marching off to war against a country that posed no threat to its safety or welfare.
If this Christian God really does exist, either He is One Supreme Fool, or we are in for one big surprise come judgment day.
