ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, December 22, 1996 TAG: 9612240018
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: 3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Alan Sorensen EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR
I SUPPOSE it is obligatory this time of year, since it's my turn to write a column, to discuss the true spirit of Christmas - you know, the spirit that crass consumerism threatens to overwhelm.
The true spirit is not, the preachers tell us, the maelstrom of commerce into which shoppers plunge, usually a long way from their parking spot, in frenzied pursuit of Tickle Me Elmo. (Too busy staring into the evening sky or reading scripture to have heard of Tickle Me Elmo? It's this year's holy grail. For those desperate and dogged enough to secure one for their toddlers, it promises deliverance from the pangs of parental inadequacy.)
No, the true spirit, ever harder to experience amid the holiday rush, has been well described as a kind of hush. A sweet stillness settling gently over you, like snow falling on a silent night; a moment of unfathomable wonder and joy, symbolized by the promise of a child born on a winter's night.
Peace on Earth.
I believe in this. I believe we all do, in different ways.
The question is how to bridge the infinite chasm between the spirit of peace and love and the actual experience of the holidays.
Some of us are tempted to yearn for (excuse the metaphor) a bridge to the past, as if to our own childhoods when Christmas seemed magical. But as the cover story in this week's U.S. News & World Report points out, "this purer, simpler, more spiritual past is more a product of our cultural imagination than of historical fact."
The magazine article observes that "the observance of Christmas was never an entirely religious affair, that many of the most popular seasonal traditions are relatively modern inventions and that complaints of crass overindulgence and gross commercialism are nearly as old as the holiday itself."
Indeed, Christmas is celebrated in December not because Jesus was born then (Bethlehem shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night would not have done so in wintertime), but because Christians co-opted the pagan festival that marks, with energetic revelry, the winter solstice. Puritans in New England even banned Christmas as "an affront unto the grace of God."
Most of us will never repudiate the Big Lie - that the next purchase will bring happiness - by withdrawing altogether from the world of Christmas consumption and attempting a return to a simpler existence. This is so not only because erstwhile luxuries and indulgences have become needs and expectations (how can we live without Elmo?), but also because nostalgia is an illusion.
Well, then, is the best strategy simply to resign ourselves to the trappings of Christmas - to find the good where we can, perhaps in the redeeming qualities of shopping?
It may help to consult the spiritual father of capitalism, the 18th century Scottish moralist Adam Smith.
The restlessness, envy, pride, ambition and covetousness that drive consuming consumption are, in themselves, "private vices," Smith argued. But they become "public virtues" by stimulating industry and invention. By this theory, buying Tickle Me Elmos keeps the economy going, which in turn does more ultimately to lift up the condition of people - including the poor - than does the most exquisitely intended charity.
I buy this insight, along with Smith's suggestion that commerce has a pacifying effect. Sociability is an asset in the marketplace; people with something to lose are less willing to take risks; war gets in the way of trading. Gradually, the advance of prosperity will cause warfare to recede.
All of which is to say the consumption culture that has taken over Christmas is not entirely at cross-purposes with the vision advanced by the Prince of Peace.
Smith himself, however, was ambivalent about the implications of his philosophy. The pursuit of deceptively attractive but ultimately empty possessions makes us, if inadvertently, social benefactors. "It is this deception which rouses and keeps in continual motion the industry of mankind," he wrote. But it is still a deception.
And since his time, we have learned - or should have learned - that the market's "invisible hand" doesn't always spread its benefits automatically.
One check on the market economy, philanthropy, has grown greatly since the days when Charles Dickens wrote The Christmas Carol. Arriving conveniently at the year's end, when benevolent minds turn to tax deductions, Christmas is a call to give. It reminds us not only that some families are left out in the cold, but also that some good people are striving year-round to help them. They need our assistance.
Another check on the consumption culture is the institution of the family. At Christmas, buying is redeemed somewhat because we buy gifts for others, not ourselves. But more important still are the family traditions and rituals by which we share and send into the future the experience of love. Cookie baking with all hands helping. Playing in the snow with hot chocolate afterwards. Encouraging children to be participants, not simply recipients, in the spirit of giving.
The Christmas spirit - that holy joy of realizing that love and peace are born into the world - may be best experienced in a moment of hushed stillness. It may be crucial, as the bumper stickers say, to visualize world peace. But I believe the spirit is best exercised, and peace will only be obtained, by doing things.
End of sermon. I have a few things still to pick up at the mall.t
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