No. 67 The Christmas Story

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Group Session Plan from FUSN (developed by Bob Zeeb)

Opening Words
From the land that produced A Christmas Carol and Handel’s Messiah, more evidence that Christianity is fading in Western Europe: Nearly 99 percent of Christmas cards sold in Great Britain contain no religious message or imagery.

Traditional pictures such as angels blowing trumpets over a stable, Jesus in his manger, the shepherds and three wise men following the star to Bethlehem are dying out,” the Daily Mail reports. A review of some 5,500 Christmas cards turns up fewer than 70 that make any reference to the birth of Jesus. “Hundreds . . . avoided any image linked to Christmas at all” even those with no spiritual significance, such as Christmas trees or Santa Claus.
Jeff Jacoby, Boston Globe

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Topic
And what about right here in the homes of American UU’s? How are we all coping with this wonderful myth, this simple story? Many of us are nervous, others frightened, still others repelled, and most curious of all, still others indifferent. What about you? Where and how did you first encounter this story? How did you relate to it in your youth? As a teen-ager and a young adult? What meaning does the story have for you now? How do you feel about it? Do you make any use of it?

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Closing Words
Stories are dangerous stuff. Some are literally true, and it is always necessary to know which claim that status. But literal stories fill our newspapers each morning and our garbage cans each evening. Others are only metaphorically true, and it is necessary to know which claim that status. It is by them we live and for them we die. They are only metaphor as around us is only air – try doing without it. Many of my academic colleagues . . . seem stuck in negativity, in the last century’s debate between the village atheist and the pious pastor. “No, it could not happen (ever).” “Yes, it did happen (once).” The future however belongs to another question. “What did those people intend to communicate by creating these stories as parables about Jesus?”
John Dominic Crossan