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In Our View: Message of Peace Needed

The Columbian
Published: December 25, 2015, 6:01am

It seems, as much as ever, that the Christmas message of peace and love and joy is needed this year. With almost daily accounts of senseless violence and hatred and man’s inhumanity to man both in the United States and abroad, questions arise about whether peace, in the end, will triumph.

Such is the nature of faith, which for many people is the foundation of their Christmas celebration. Faith in the belief that Jesus was sent to save humanity from itself; faith in the power of the message that is celebrated every year at this time. Whether or not one believes in the religious foundation of the holiday, we all can use this time to reflect upon human shortcomings and the hope for a better future.

The Christmas story, which appears in two of the four Gospels of The Bible, is viewed by many as a parable. As Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan write in “The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach Us About Jesus’ Birth,” Jesus was famous for parables that “invited his bearers into a different way of seeing how things are and how we might live.” And, as Gregory Rodriguez writes in an essay for the Los Angeles Daily News: “The story of the birth of Jesus clearly is more than sentimental. It’s about the weak and the wise outsmarting the powerful. It’s about the humble and faithful turning the world upside down.”

That message is embraced and celebrated by both the Christian and the secular, because the overriding meaning of the season is one that is not confined by religious boundaries. Even Christianity has many sects that hold differing views of Christ’s birth, life and resurrection. And there are many other faiths that respect Jesus as a prophet, if not the literal son of God. Throughout these conflicting views, a common thread of Christmas can be found.

On Sept. 21, 1897, editorial writer Francis Pharcellus Church of The New York Sun wrote: “The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are seen and unseeable in the world.” Church was responding to a letter from an 8-year-old reader who asked whether there is a Santa Claus — a fairly narrow question. Yet the meaning of his response can be expanded to all facets of the holiday, encapsulating the hope that arrives with the season.

That season has endured for some 2,000 years, providing a consistent call for peace and understanding through strife and wars and plagues. Even through centuries of religious conflicts, times in which adherents have all too often distorted the teachings they profess to hold dear. Pick any point in recorded history, and you are certain to find examples of humankind’s foibles; you are certain to find examples in which we have failed to live up to our highest ideals. Yet Christmas provides an annual reminder of the value of love and family and faith.

So it is that we celebrate Christmas today. Weeks or months of shopping have been concluded; the decorations have been completed; the feasts have been planned and the families have gathered. And in the end there lingers a hope that peace will, indeed, triumph and that all of mankind can embrace the message of kindness and compassion toward others — regardless of their personal beliefs.

Merry Christmas to all.

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