Yule is Cool

In this age of worshipping our craniums and picking apart our history and customs, looking down our noses at Christmas has become fashionable in certain circles. Yes, it’s not Christian. Yes, it’s basically pagan and thus rowdy and uncontrollable. Yes, it’s become overlaid with centuries of traditions to the point that it’s bulging set to burst. Yes, it’s not part of Quakerism.

But my argument always is: So is popcorn—and we still eat it.

What’s so wrong about having a nonChristian, pagan, nonQuaker, heavily traditioned, rowdy feastday?

Here in the north, our outer world has gone dark and cold. The snow is deep, and the wind has a particular howl to it that only leaves on trees can muffle. Survival is a real concept in the winter: only fools think otherwise. Who wouldn’t want to call back the sun?

What’s more important, our inner world has gone dark and cold too. We are a species of storytellers. We exist for myth and tradition. Without these, our minds and souls starve. And education has a way of nudging out myth and tradition, so that the story-hungry part of our psyche goes dark.

Christmas provides two ingredients we crave: myth and tradition. That these myths and traditions are ancient, predating history and spanning all nordic cultures, makes them all the more compelling.

The myth of the baby king born in the dark and cold of a stable, unwanted by all, but known to the lowly. The Godly in us, the surreal in the dirt, the frailty of greatness. People drawing closer in the darkness, led by something they don’t understand, to find someone for whom there was no room at the inn.

For children, the myth of Santa, reindeer, magic, baby Jesus.

These stories have helped create the landscapes of our minds, our collective unconscious in Jung’s terms. They’ve played again and again since our children, like a mantra repeated, or a hypnotism tape playing in the background. It’s time once again to visit them.

I know Quakers would rather not need myth and tradition, but we are no different than other people. We could choose not to have a Christmas tree because it’s wasteful, not to bake traditional foods because they’re fattening, not to sing carols because we don’t like the words, or tell stories because we don’t believe the events. But then, what would Christmas be? A day like any other day. And we would be impoverished for it.

I think of Christmas (and our other collective traditions and myths) as a chalice that’s been handed down from generation to generation, crusted with everything other ages thought was meaningful and worthy of celebration and filled with ideas, beliefs, fears. It’s now been passed to us. Our task is to take the cup, sift through the contents, touch them all, connect with the past, then put back in the cup--changed or unchanged--what we’ll pass to the next generation.

It’s about connection.

Having said all that, there are two relatively new traditions I could very much do without, and one old myth that I could do with.

The first tradition is materialism—a tradition that soaks the holiday and clouds the light. We try to change the focus on giving, rather than receiving; but to have a giver, you must have a receiver, so it’s really a bit of a cop-out. Sending shoeboxes of trinkets to third-world countries because we believe it’s so important to get stuff at Christmas shows how remarkably google-eyed we are about worshipping Mammon.

The other tradition is “Jesus is the Reason for the Season.” This is from the people who would make Christmas copyright. “It’s only for us Christians,” they say, “so you others just stay out.” They take what was once everyone’s festival and then steal it entirely.

The myth I could do with is Peace on Earth. It’s now within our grasp. We have the teachings of Jesus and the model of Gandhi. New notions of global interrelatedness could make it happen.

We pray for it at Christmas. Then we need to go out and answer our own prayers.

Nancy

PS Have a cool Yule, everyone.