Ponderings

The cookies that remain are stale, retail stores have slashed their prices, and Benazir Bhutto is dead. It would seem that Christmas is over.

Our church calendar, however, says that Christmas is just beginning. Today is the fourth of the twelve days of Christmas which culminate with Epiphany and the celebration of the Wise men’s arrival on the scene. According to the church calendar, Christmas didn’t even begin until the stores were closing (sunset) on December 24th. Clearly one could conclude that the church is out of step with society. And maybe it is so.

But I’m sitting at my computer in my new bathrobe and slippers, with one teen asleep down the hall and the other downstairs playing a computer game. It’s 9:19am and no one is rushing off. Homework folders are still buried under the new gadgets and the pile of dishes on the kitchen counter is eliciting little excitement. Perhaps the church calendar is on to something.

Gary is at work and already I’ve been to church a couple of times, but the rhythm is slower. The frenzy of life, eclipsed only by the extreme excess of an American Christmas, is suspended in this ‘in between’ time. I’ll do some tasks, then I’ll settle back onto the couch with the kids for another movie. I think the church calendar gets this one right.

P.S. Hope to see you on Sunday, we’ll explore the 6th day of Christmas together. Pajamas optional.

Admittedly, I am culturally challenged. I’m illiterate when it comes to sports and my radio is tuned to NPR, I depend on CNN’s daily “quick news” to keep me from totally embarrassing myself. I fear that I may be passing this liability on to my daughter. Yesterday, she came home bewildered by ways in which the news of the day had filled the hallways at school. Luckily I had scanned the news enough to know that Britney is an entertainer and the news was scandal not celebration, just enough knowledge to carry on a conversation with my own teen.

To be fair, the news of the day is Britney’s sister, not the diva herself. Apparently, Brittney’s younger sister, age 16, is following not only Brittney’s musical footsteps but also her ability to gather scurrilous press. Jamie Lynn Spears is sixteen years old, single, and pregnant. But what’s the fuss? Given that nearly 1/3 of teenage girls get pregnant, one might wonder what is particularly newsworthy here.

Despite the high number of teenage pregnancies, teen pregnancy is still a cultural taboo. The pregnancy is newsworthy (apparently) because once again, a celebrity is breaking the mythical rules. Tragically, the only thing we do more quickly than raising folks on pedestals is devouring them when they fall.

But what of the taboo?

This taboo is perhaps authored by our religious convictions, but it is enforced by our economy. In a society where high school takes us to age 18 and college to age 21 (at least!), babies in our teen years invariably impede our education. Although some schools provide innovative and quality childcare options, an estimated 2/3 of teenagers with children will drop out. Even after the babies are themselves in school, the moms, without completing an educational course themselves, cannot compete in our increasingly high tech work force. Teenage pregnancy unwittingly paves the way for a lifetime of poverty.

With the ‘news’ of a high profile pregnant teen on the eve of our spiritual pilgrimage to the Bethlehem, we have an opportunity to revisit the religious roots of our judgment. Timing is essential to good irony, and the timing of this unexpected pregnancy just happens to coincide with our Christian celebration of an unwed pregnant teen. Around the world this week, children will don bathrobes and tie scarves on their heads, re-enacting Mary and Joseph’s fateful trek. As the opening words of Matthew and Luke are again read this weekend, we cannot help but see the irony.

In our telling of the story, of course, there was no backseat passion, but the scandal was every bit as damning. Yet our story doesn’t stop with the scandal. Our story promises it is in the unexpected, the vulnerable, and the culturally despised that the messiah comes. If we would seek the messiah, the incarnate presence of the Holy One, we might look at the base of the pedestal. In the remains of the public scorn, the long awaited one might be beckoning.

As we read the news, we need not settle for scandal. Maybe it’s because I’m a mother of teens, but I am increasingly loathe to cast moral judgment. Beyond the judgment there is room for concern, concern for the health and safety of the teen, her mother, and her baby. My yearning is for a world where pregnancy is safe and babies are welcomed with food, clothing, and shelter. As we seek the Holy One in unexpected places, I cannot help but pray that we might have the grace to work a society more welcoming of life.

And I pray that Jamie Lynn will be lucky enough to have a daughter like mine with whom she can, even in the rubble, ponder the meaning of our cultural iconography and the costliness of our judgments.

My ponderer is sore. My week, indeed this past season, has been filled with pondering. Pondering that is cursed with infinite loops.

As the leaves ever so gradually shed their color and fell to the ground, my firstborn daughter’s struggle with life escalated not quite so imperceptibly. Broken legs can be set and re-grow (at least in youth!), hearts and minds are not so clearly defined or neatly addressed.

Following a particularly difficult week, the role of pondering mother eclipsed the pastor. My week has been spent with the phone in my pocket and repetitive tasks to fill the time, my emotions an unrelenting refrain of fear, guilt, and confusion. Missing essentially a full week of church life and responsibilities, I cannot help but be grateful for the incredible staff and the special gifts of Marilyn and Al.

Tonight all is well, at least as well ever is. (Lee Whiston once told me that “utopia is no-place”, non existent.) Tomorrow I’ll return to church and a whisper of normalcy.

I am at once grateful to be in a community of understanding and humbled. The rich texture of our community is dense enough to provide safety and warmth. Time cocooned is time not spent in the intricacy, and I grieve that loss even as I cherish the comfort.

The Christmas buzz this year is peppered with campaign news and political sound-bytes. The juxtaposition between holiday cheer and candidate rhetoric is tragicomedy. This afternoon Bing Crosby’s crooning about the little drummer boy was interrupted by campaign promises to rid the world (or at least this nation) of illegal immigrants.

Understandably the immigration ‘issue’ is appropriate policy ground in this campaign cycle. Immigrationcounters.com is a data crunching website that estimates that there are 21 million illegal immigrants in the United States. This means that there are tens of millions of adults who are working and paying taxes (no one gets a reprieve from the IRS) but who have no legal status. We’re not talking a few lawn services, we’re talking about a major labor field. Immigration Counters estimates that these adults add 4 million children to the public school system and send billions of dollars back home. Admittedly this site is not keen on illegal immigrants.

In several places on their site I saw the term “anchor babies”. This term is new to me and in this season of making ready for new birth, I was curious. Turns out that the phrase was coined by a site called Numbersusa.com and refers to the babies born in the United States to illegal immigrants. Babies born in the United States, regardless of parentage, are granted citizenship. Both Numbers USA and Immigration Counts argue that by granting citizenship to the children, we are providing refuge (anchors) for the parents. Anchor babies.

Opposing birthright citizenship is but one of many ways currently proposed to discourage immigration. Although we of pale skin cannot deny our own immigrant histories, a plausible concern has been raised not only about process but also about the ability of our land and our economy to sustain the burgeoning population. Roy Beck, Executive Director of Numbers USA, opposes both immigration and immigrant bashing. He writes, “The chief difficulties that America faces because of current immigration are not triggered by who the immigrants are but by how many they are.”

Simply put, Beck argues that the inn is full. As I hear the steady beat of the drummer boy, I wonder.

The smoothness of Bing Crosby’s crooning belies the edginess of the hymn. Although the song is one of my favorite, I loathed the movie as a child. I was incredibly frightened by the violence at the beginning and the unabating vulnerability of the boy throughout the story. He meets the worst kind of people and his life is an unremitting nightmare. Even as a child I knew that the fictitious story is all too real.

The story of the poor drummer boy is about as sad as they come, unless of course you consider the lot of the one to whom he sings. Jesus, we’re told, was born in a barn and spent his childhood as a refugee. Although Christmas American-style involves billions of dollars in retail, the one whose birth we celebrate didn’t even rate a crib.

The good folk at Numbers USA are concerned that there isn’t room at the inn. Assuming that they are correct, the pertinent question as we approach Christmas Eve is whether we’ll open the barn.