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Thursday, December 23, 1999 G©IMM(gI]ltelPy The Southern Cross, Page 5
Everyday Graces
Something in me wants to he Scrooge
L ately, something in me wants to be
Scrooge. Maybe I could attribute this
sour attitude to the unseasonable weath
er, those springlike temperatures. I
could attribute it to the fact my chil
dren are outgrowing many of the sim
ple, childish pleasures of the season.
Gone are the days when talk of Santa
permeated the house. With only one of
my children young enough to believe in
him, Santa doesn’t get much attention
around here any more. In my Scrooge-like
tendencies this season, I haven’t
addressed a Christmas card, bought a
gift.
I haven’t even made a list. If my children knew
this, they would panic, but, honestly, I don’t
know what to buy them. The older they become,
the harder it is for me to reconcile what they
want with what I believe they should have. My
husband is no help. He refuses to shop until
Christmas Eve, and his only advice on purchas
ing gifts for the children is “Don’t get tpem any
more stuff.” • j
He’s right, of course. They have enough stuff.
How familiar I’ve become with stuff. How clear
ly I remember the time and energy it tqok to sort,
box, and transport stuff, theirs and our$, when
we moved to a new home.
The “stuff issue” notwithstanding, it isn’t right
for a mother of four children to be a Scrooge.
The children are full of excitement. They wake
each morning eager to open a new window on
the Advent calendar. They want to go to the mall
at every opportunity. And they ask me, over
and over again, “ When are we getting
the tree?”
It might be okay if my Scroogeness
were a response to rampant material
ism and the commercialization of a
holy season, but it isn’t that noble,
that pure. It is closer to a melancholy,
a world-weariness, a sense of having
done all this before. Surely, I don’t
want to project this attitude to my fami
ly. Surely, my children’s visions of sug
arplums should not be soured by
Mother’s crab-apple moods.
So, I’m trying to discover ways to restore my
enthusiasm. Despite my reluctance to enter into
the trappings, there have been lovely moments in
the last weeks. When I find myself lacking
enthusiasm for the holiday festivities and rituals,
I must dwell in those sweet moments, so the joys
of the season won’t elude me.
I will remember the performance of the grade-
school chorus in their Christmas production.
Although secular, this production was a glowing
testimony to the gifts the Spirit brings us in com
munity: children’s voices raised in song, danc
ing, bright costumes and scenery, the enchanted
faces of the younger children in the audience, the
beaming faces of parents and teachers when the
performers took their bows.
I will remember the evening, when, trying to
improve my disposition, I went to the piano to
play Christmas carols. My playing is mediocre at
best, excruciating at worst, but when she heard
the piano, 8-year-old Anna abandoned the televi
sion set in the other room and plopped next to
me on the bench. As my fingers hobbled over the
keys, Anna sang “Silent Night”. Hearing her
sweet, small voice and witnessing her enthusi
asm for my meager skill were touching, even to
this Scrooge.
I will remember discovering the holly tree in
the woods next to my home. And I will remem
ber clipping holly boughs and filling baskets of
them to carry inside. I will remember the sensual
pleasure I took in trimming the insect-eaten
leaves, rinsing off the dirt and spider webs,
removing the pine needles, and arranging the
boughs along the mantel. I will remember the
satisfaction I felt when everyone came home at
the end of the day and exclaimed about their
beauty. And I will remember the children’s
amazement to learn I could decorate a room
without purchasing anything from a store.
By dwelling on these moments, my small joys
of the season, I hope to shrug off this awkward
attitude. Otherwise, like an oversized coat, this
melancholy will swallow me up, restrict my
movement. Indeed, I need movement now more
than ever. To remain static, unmoved, untouched,
in this season is to be hopelessly lost. Only when
I am willing to step outside my own darkness
will I be guided to radiant wonders — to the
place where a Savior is bom and to the place in
my heart prepared to adore him.
Mary Hood Hart lives with her husband and
four children in Sunset Beach, N.C.
Mary Hood Hart
In the company of Mary we come to know her Son
O ur favorite texts for Christmas,
those that tell of Jesus being
laid in the manger and the visit of
angels and shepherds are found
only in the Gospel of Luke. The
story of the Magi led by the star is !
only in Matthew’s gospel.
Somehow all of these precious
memories must find their origin in
his mother Mary. Luke twice says
of her, “Mary kept all these things,
reflecting on them in her heart”
(Luke 2:19, 51). Mother Mary thus
is the beginning of the church of
contemplation, the community of
divine wisdom, which ponders long
and deeply all that God has done
and is doing.
As he was dying on the cross,
Jesus told the beloved disciple,
“Behold your Mother.” “And from
the hour, the disciple took her into
his home” (John 19:27). The
Gospel according to John probes
most deeply into the mystery of
who Jesus is, and in the prologue
makes the truly profound proclama
tion, “In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with
God, and the Word was
God ...and the Word
became flesh, and made
his dwelling among us,
and we saw his glory,
the glory as of the
Lather’s only Son, full
of grace and truth”
(John 1:1, 14).
Is it a coincidence that
the one who lived in the
company of Mary, also is the
one who gave us this Father Michael H. Smith
remarkably deep and
rich understanding of our Lord and
Savior? Our Catholic treasure
house of prayer offers us the
Rosary as a way to continue living
in the company of Mary, the one
who “treasured in her heart” (Luke
2:51) all that happened to her Son
Jesus. Mary was given to the early
church and now to us as a tutor in
how to be taught and led by the
Spirit Jesus promised, because she
had already experienced being
“overshadowed” by the Holy Spirit
at the time of Jesus’ concep
tion.
The rosary is basically a
set of prayer beads,
organized as five sets
of ten beads or
“decades” plus a few
introductory beads
and a crucifix. To
each decade is
assigned a mystery or
event in the life of
L_
° Jesus. Catholic tradi
tion has presently set
tled on three sets of
five mysteries: Joyful, Sorrowful
and Glorious. Each decade begins
with the Lord’s Prayer, so that we
may firmly situate ourselves in
Jesus’ attitude to God, which also
echoes Mary’s acceptance of God’s
will when she said, “Let it be done
to me according to your word.”
Then the traditional “Hail Mary”
is said ten times, being used some
what as an hourglass, to define a set
time for meditation on a particular
mystery, but also in prayer that we
will ponder and penetrate this event
of Jesus’ life in the spirit of Mary.
The decade ends with a doxology
praising the Trinity, echoing Mary’s
spirit of praise in the Magnificat of
Luke 1:46-55. Sound complicated?
It is, but once learned, many find it
a very calming way to pray—very
helpful in times of stress and grief,
as well as in nurturing the contem
plative dimension of the life of
faith.
The Rosary is a good example of
a traditional Catholic practice
which is not itself found in the
Scriptures, but seems to have its
origins in the Biblical description
of Mary as the one who “kept all
these things, reflecting on them in
her heart.” Try using it to ponder
the wonderful events we celebrate
in this Christmas season
Father Michael H. Smith, V.F., is
pastor of Holy Redeemer, McRae,
and Saint Mark, Eastman.