There is no doubt that this holiday becomes an opportunity to express a variety of agendas.
1. The economic agenda: consumer spending help return us to prosperity
2. The Christendom agenda: recapture cultural dominance of a religious tradition from its religious competitors
3. The resist-Christendom agenda: As in NJ, good time to set the record straight.
4. the Christian-renewal agenda: time to turn the screws down harder on however one judges others to be letting the faith down. That could be church attendance, issues of “private morality”, issues of social justice, etc.

To all of this I ask “Why did angels sing instead of admonish?” If we can answer that question then we can celebrate. In a great party the focus is on the reason of celebration rather than criticizing the other party goers. That doesn’t mean that all means of celebration are equally in keeping with the cause of celebration, it just gives us the freedom to receive a gift and to let go of the constant, oppressive need to always look sideways.

Take some time this December (it’s a dark month here in Sacramento, people need a bit of cheer anyway) to enjoy the fact that God is so good and generous as to not leave us in our misery and not to exclude himself from the suffering we have brought upon ourselves but to join us and bring an end to the age of decay, Satan’s prison and our own miserable, petty self-destruction. pvk