One of the things I love most about my Catholic tradition and observance is the season of Christmas. We love everything about the season and have little trouble incorporating other worldly traditions within our celebration season.
Kick it off with Santa Claus (or St Nick, or Father Christmas, or Sinterklauss)? Sure!
That doesn't really take away from the birth of the baby Jesus unless we allow it to. Because it isn't really even about the birth - because we don't really know when that was anyway...
It's about the second coming.
It's about Jesus in our lives.. past, present and future...
The Christmas season merely begins with Christmas Day - not ends with it.
We continue to use the seasonal motifs to celebrate, to ponder, to approach life with childlike wonder.
We celebrate the Birth of Our Lord on Christmas Day, the Feast of the Holy Family on the Sunday between Christmas and New Years Day.... and the Feast of Mary, the Mother of God as we begin our new calendar year
We end the Christmas season with the Feast of the Epiphany - followed up by the Baptism of Our Lord as the first observance in Ordinary Time. Our liturgical calendar follows the life of Jesus.
But back to Christmas season.... I love that we celebrate and think about the family as an integral part of our lives... and we meditate on how to make our families a place of health and peace the way God intended it to be.
I love that we spend the time searching.
And we end when we find the truth as the 3 (or 12) wise men (or kings) did.... it's not about the historical details.. not really.
It's about the search for Jesus in our lives.... along with the celebration that he is here... right now.
And it's about the certain knowledge that Jesus belongs to the world.. not the select few who have performed the perfect rites... or said the magic words... or followed any rule set down by humans. He belongs to all of us.
If you are a Christian.. you know your belief and you can end your Christmas celebration with remembering what you find.
We are all children of God. And there is nothing we can do to change that. We are beloved by virtue of our birth.
Period.
And that is certainly worth celebrating!
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