Reason for the Season

As this December rolls around, many news outlets are saying people won’t be buying as many presents as in previous years. Some say the holidays have become more low key and that folks aren’t spending as much. Secularists question if the ‘holidays’ are becoming less important than before or if everyone is starting to consider what’s more important than presents. Maybe people are focusing on family or on charity or on some deeper meaning to this time of year and they just can’t put their fingers on it. We Catholics might have our heads in our hands as we look on, because there’s always been something, ahem, Someone more important than presents every Christmas.

Let’s break this down to one simple sentence: Jesus was born.

To start, let’s repeat: Jesus was born. Jesus is King. He doesn’t need us. He doesn’t need subjects or riches or a palace or anything we mere humans might provide. He already had everything before He was born here on earth. He is sovereign before all this. Yet, it was He who chose to come down to us. He chose to become a human baby in a lowly state, in the poorest, most vulnerable manner. He left it all out of Love for us. No other earthly king has done anything like that. Only Jesus can do that.

Jesus was born. It’s historical so that even atheists know the event really happened. Sure, they’ll say a ‘man named Jesus lived, preached, and died.’ They’ll agree with that much at least because there are records of it happening. It’s not just a story but it’s history. We have that argument won easily.

Jesus was born. I couldn’t help but go into this a little before, but He didn’t just float down on a cloud. He chose to come as a vulnerable little baby born into poverty. Not only was He so small and dependent on His mother for everything, but He had to grow up, just, like, us. He may have been bullied. He may have tripped. He may have struggled. He was human (as well as divine.) We can never say He doesn’t understand our humanity because He bore it.

We’ve always held the true ‘reason for the season’ at Christmas time. We’ve always known there’s more to this season than presents. We’ve also always known that Christmas begins the evening of December 24th, not the day after Thanksgiving. Advent has begun and too often people think it’s Christmas season. Never mind that some of us, er, not sure who but we might like to listen to Christmas tunes in November. Nothing wrong with a little extra cheer.

So, while news channels and the general public hem and haw over spending sprees and what it could mean for the season, we’ve known all along. This Advent is all about (the same thing it’s always been about) preparing for a King, a King who gives up His whole world out of Love for His children. Let’s prepare our hearts more than we prepare the tree or the house. Let’s show others that we’ve known all along what Christmas is all about.