VALSON THAMPU

Christmas has a thousand faces. So, it means different things to different people. Or, is it, rather, that Christmas is always the same; and we read it differently, depending on who we are? In that case, is Christmas a mirror held up to us?
That reminds me of Sree Narayana Guru. He installed a mirror as the prathishta in one of the temples. He did not explain why in so many words. Perhaps his intention was to suggest that worshippers should look within; for God is within them. By the way, Jesus had said something to that effect. The Kingdom of God is among you. Or, ‘The Kingdom of God is within you.’
In that case, why did the shepherds and the Wise Men from the East have to go to Bethlehem? They could have stayed put and merely looked within. A great deal of hardships could have been avoided. But there is a problem. Looking within, is not as easy as it might seem. Dickens has a character called Pecksniff in Dombey and Son. He looks above, below, to the left, to the right; in short, everywhere, except at. We are not greatly unlike Pecksniff. We look here, there, everywhere; except within ourselves. We need some training in looking within.
Physical light is a great help in looking at. It is not of much use in looking within. Light of some other kind is needed for that purpose. Jesus is that light. In that case, it is not quite felicitous to describe him as ‘the light of the world.’ It might be better to put this as ‘light for the world.’ But then, the world may not want this light. The light that the world wants is the light to look at; more commonly, the light to be seen in. Between this ‘looking at’ and ‘being seen in,’ the reality of being human is lost sight of.
The words above are intended to raise the question of how we see, or understand, Christmas. There are two possibilities in this regard. Either we may see it in the mode of ‘looking at.’ Or, we may do so in the mode of looking within. What happens, if we adopt the second mode?
Suddenly, the Christmas Event becomes all about us. We are, all of us, babes. This is not a small thing; for the babe is the reason for the hope we entertain. Child, wrote Wordsworth, is the father of man. It all begins with the babe. Not only the salvific history, but also our personal stories. We were babes. The Good News is that we still are babes in the eyes of God the Father. We have difficulty in seeing God as our Father because we have become adults. We should wish to be babes, for our own sake. Babes are closer to life. Our distance from life must be measured by the steps we have taken away from childhood. Freedom is all about relating to God as children relate to parents. Some do. We call them saints.
We are also the shepherds keeping vigil at night. Work, thank God, is an important aspect of our life. There are two modes of working. In the first, we labour. This makes us weary and heavy-laden. We can also be in partnership with God in all that we do. In that case we work. It is up to us to labour or to work. Slaves labour. Others work. Many slave and slog. This is a personal choice, not an inescapable curse. Jesus benchmarked work. ‘Doing my Father’s will,’ He said, ‘is food for me.’ Surely, that is not labour! That is work as a celebration! Only from such a spiritual state can anyone say, ‘I have come, not to be served; but to serve.’ Imagine the Shepherds of Bethlehem sleeping, rather than keeping vigil, at this Kairos-moment in history!
We are, besides, the Wise Men from the East too. They are the outsiders who find a foothold in the Story of stories. Most of us didn’t have any claim. We didn’t merit anything. We didn’t belong. We were aliens. But, somehow, we too have found a place in the Story. How did that happen? Well, the Star knows. And the Star! Strange star this. Most people assume stars have a bias in favour of mega cities. That is because they are inured to film stars. There’s stardom of a different order as well. Cine stardom is beyond my reach; I don’t know about yours. But this other Stardom is, strangely, within my reach. I would have sounded presumptuous, if Jesus had not said so. ‘Greater things than I have done,’ Jesus said, ‘you will do, if you believe in me’. That’s Stardom enough for me. I only have to attain it. I don’t have to kill myself for it, like Sushant Singh Rajput. I only have to believe.
Finally, we are also something that the worldly scheme of things cannot know or master. Add all the ingredients of the Christmas Event. Think you, you get Christmas? There is something about it that’s quite beyond the logic of the world. This is what speaks to me reassuringly from the entire narrative. Because of Christmas, it is not ‘that thou art’ (tat tvam asi), but ‘that thou art, and more, much more.’ You are something other than all this. Hurray! This is not megalomania. This is the glory and burden of being human. It is not that no other babe was like that Babe in Bethlehem. It is that there never was and never will be another babe like you or me. This is not bragging; but of acknowledging responsibility. No human being is displaceable. Archimedes is of no use in spirituality. There’s no substitution by volume. What you can do, I can’t; and vice versa. There’s none – not even a Judas – who doesn’t have a definite place in the plan of God. Even so, the sobering fact remains, ‘Woe unto him through whom the offence comes.’
It’s long since I celebrated Christmas. A few decades ago, the unmanning agony of Mary hit me with a force I couldn’t endure. Something snapped within me. The plight of a woman in the world of men! Over the mixed bag the world is, the Star still twinkles. Angels still sing: there’s hope yet.