All the jollification was there when we celebrated the advocate of children and orthodoxy: jolly old Saint Nicholas.
We stood in a long line as various people, many Russians, numerous Greeks, and cautious Syrians, prepared to pray at the tomb of Saint Nicholas in Muslim Turkey. There were more than a few Turks. False piety was impossible, because the lines were too long for the mask to hold. Instead, we endured, as good people must do, and then were able to pray.
”God save us. Saint Nicholas pray for us.”
Saint Nicholas was there at the end of the line as jollity always is. We venerated our hero, the pastor who cared for right doctrine and justice for the poor. We worshipped our God: the Being who inspired Nicholas to become an image of Christmas.
Nothing is more fitting just now than this man whose sanctity protected the poor and good ideas being associated with Christmas. The Word became flesh and so Logic gained a beating heart. That is so profound that even Saint Nicholas hardly could grasp the totality. He did his best to act on that great truth.
God became man.
Really.
Not sort of.
Not kind of.
God became man and took on our whole humanity, broken as it was, and then redeemed everything. Saint Nicholas refused anything less than this astounding truth and so saved us from error. He also worked to help people he knew that were oppressed by systematic injustice, because God becoming man made justice to the poor a mandate for the pious!
Saint Nicholas took seriously the words of Jesus: 25 And there went great multitudes with Him, and He turned and said unto them, 26 “If any man come to Me and hate not his father and mother, and wife and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple.27 And whosoever doth not bear his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.”
This sounds harsh, but imagine if one made Christmas less than amazing. Zeus always was posturing as a man. He would show up and get what he wanted, but he was never really a human. Christmas is the twelve days where we remember that the all Good God became an actual man. Saint Nicholas would not accept anything less than this amazing truth.
Love became man and so we can love licitly. Love was willing to be crucified by political men who hated justice. Love won and so fear should never motivate us again. We cannot love a nation, a people, an army, anything more than God. Our love of the Good, Truth, and Beauty must be so great that any other (lesser) lover must look (almost) like hate by comparison.
We will not compromise. God is God. Caesar is not Lord.
Later, more secular writers, turned Saint Nicholas into jolly old Saint Nicholas. . . Santa Claus. Whatever was intended by this reduction, and who can be sure, they got the jollity right. Purity, holiness, and justice are always jolly in the end. Justice can be hard to find, but in the end is joyous.
We got to the tomb and asked God to have mercy. Christmas, jollification for all, is mercy even for those who will not pray. Thank God.
Jolly old Saint Nicholas lend your ear this way. Pray that those who would unman our faith and oppress the poor be defeated. Grant all of us salvation from our sins. May we live in truth forever.
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