{"id":659851,"date":"2023-12-01T15:51:46","date_gmt":"2023-12-01T19:51:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/?p=659851"},"modified":"2023-12-01T15:51:46","modified_gmt":"2023-12-01T19:51:46","slug":"on-jangling-jingle-bells-all-the-way-to-the-jungles-of-palestine-and-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/659851\/","title":{"rendered":"On Jangling \u201cJingle Bells All the Way\u201d to the Jungles of Palestine and Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"My very first Christmas away from home was in 1969, when I heard Andy Williams\u2019 song “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” in Edinburgh. Albeit, I was kind of lost and nostalgic along with a few overseas students from Taiwan, Israel, Kenya and Jamaica while the local students went home for Christmas. My classmates from Northern Ireland couldn\u2019t go home because of the conflict between the Irish Republican Army and the British Army \u2013 at least their parents came over to entertain them during the holidays.<\/p>\n

Evening worship services of carols and lessons were very much part of our formative years. While the joyful worshippers enjoyed the festal activities at the Christ Church in Thiruvanthapuram hardly anyone was singing \u2018Jingle bells\u2019 in the Chenkalchoola colony. Prior to my first Christmas in Edinburgh \u2013 home away from home, I was cautioned to stay away from the Grassmarket where the down-and-out were too inebriate to sing \u201cJingle bells.\u201d<\/p>\n

Being students, my wife Joyan and I went our separate ways soon after our wedding in Singapore. She had to return to do her internship at Lady Hardinge Medical College and I had an assignment at Queen\u2019s University. Our first Canadian Christmas as a family was in Oxford Mills in the Ottawa Valley where I was ordained to serve the church in 1975. While I was getting used to the rural parish, Joyan had her bucket list of fun things to do for the festive season. Hang a favourite ornament on our $5.00 White Spruce Christmas tree, go sledding with our Youth Group, get candy cane, holiday movie, our first snowman, bake goodies for guests, send greetings to family and friends, keep warm in the freezing Ottawa Valley winter, take a picture with Santa at Billings Bridge Shopping Centre, go caroling, listen to Liona Boyd\u2019s Christmas music, enjoy eggnog\u2026etc.<\/p>\n

During the summer holidays it was almost like a pilgrimage to join my brother and his family in Skokie, Illinois. Joyan would collect colourful festive knick-knacks wherever we traveled such as Edinburgh – Scotland, Jalan Kayu \u2013 Singapore, Gore – New Zealand, Quincy Market – Boston, etc. However, the longer you live, the more imperative it is to learn to live with ambiguity in life. Sure, it is easier said than done. The graphic pictures of atrocities unfolding in Kyiv and Gaza helped me to look beyond my own grieving process this year. For the innocent hostages, it is mighty hard to sing \u201cJingle Bells\u201d in the Gaza tunnels this Christmas.<\/p>\n

During the pre-Christmas season, known as Advent, members of our darting elevator community keep asking, \u201cAre you ready for Christmas\u201d? For sure, getting ready for Christmas includes shopping, travel plans, guests, gift-wrapping, eating and sipping eggnog. Is this the most wonderful time of the year for you? Hope it is. Not for the vulnerable civilians under attack in Ukraine. And certainly not for the dozens of innocent hostages hidden in the tunnels in Gaza \u2013 civilians, children, soldiers, peace activists, grandparents from more than forty countries. Whether in Ukraine or Gaza \u201cpower\u201d is the ultimate aphrodisiac for the aggressors.<\/p>\n

Can the Baby of Bethlehem save us from violence and war? Can the prince of peace save us humans who try to play God like mythical Icarus \u201cflying too near the sun\u201d of artificial intelligence? James Forbes once said: \u201cPeople in the white church think God needs them. People in the black church know that they need God.\u201d<\/p>\n

Conformity must offer us both integrity towards identity of character to fit in as well as innate independence to foster critical thinking. It is hale and hearty to differ from the traditional \u201creligious imaginary.\u201dSome sing carols and listen to the story of the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem while others celebrate \u201cCristesMaesse,\u201d the Mass of Christ from ancient Greek Christ\u00f3s meaning \u201canointed\u201d a translation of classical Hebrew m\u0101\u0161\u00eea\u1e25or\u201cmessiah.\u201d Jesus was familiar with his title Messiah and yet his foreign title Christ\u00f3s overly used in the church as if it is his \u2018last name\u2019!<\/p>\n

Jesus was born in Palestine. Jesus was not born on December 25th, albeit the birth of Jesus is celebrated by majority of his followers on this day. Early disciples did not celebrate his birth. The industrious farmers and hunters in the Greco-Roman sticks needed a seasonable mid-winter break similar to spring break in Canada. Most cultures amplify a whopper about faith traditions. However, what day is Jesus\u2019 birthday is still a mystery; no religion exists without mysterious myths.<\/p>\n

The angels sang \u201cGlory to God in the highest\u201d and the shepherds, in their joy, \u201cwent back to their fields glorifying and praising God.\u201d However, the emperor and his soldiers were busy scheming to smother Mary\u2019s son Jesus. The same way the hostages must flee to Egypt for a breath of fresh air of freedom, Baby Jesus had to do the same in the desolate desert. Without Egypt, no belting \u2018jingle bells\u2019 during this festive season.<\/p>\n

Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna and the fishermen took three decades to sing \u201cjingle bells.\u201d The evil empire took three hundred years to do the same! Suddenly the pagan empire became spiritual to annex more colonies elsewhere with the help of the Good News of Jesus. So, the traditional pageant goes on and on in our fading memories, our bleak city streets and hopefully in the ravaged deserts, shrines and shelters of our world.<\/p>\n

May you have vim and win to get creative things done,
\nMay the bright sun guide you on your journeys,
\nMay you be refreshed by snow squalls and rain drops,
\nMay you have enough dough to pay for your spread,
\nMay you slow down and enjoy those around you,
\nMay the Holy One and a friend be always your company.<\/p>\n

(The Reverend Dr. John T. Mathew is an ordained minister in The United Church of Canada, former faculty at Huntington\/Laurentian University, founding president of Sudbury Interfaith Dialogue, Merrill Fellow (Harvard University), Pastor-Theologian (Center of Theological Inquiry, Princeton, NJ), ecumenical guest minister at St. Machar\u2019s Cathedral, Aberdeen, The Church of Scotland and interim minister in The Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My very first Christmas away from home was in 1969, when I heard Andy Williams\u2019 song “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” in Edinburgh. Albeit, I was kind of lost and nostalgic along with a few overseas students from Taiwan, Israel, Kenya and Jamaica while the local students went home for Christmas. My classmates from Northern Ireland couldn\u2019t go home because of the conflict between the Irish Republican Army and the British Army \u2013 at least their parents came over to entertain them during the holidays. Evening worship…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":659852,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47746],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-659851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=659851"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659851\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":659853,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659851\/revisions\/659853"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/659852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=659851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=659851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.malayalamdailynews.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=659851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}