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A CHRISTMAS MEDITATION

Several events in my past have made indelible to my understanding that Christmas is indeed all enthusiasts say it is and more It is indeed “the most wonderful time of the year,” just as the song says. And I'm not thinking only of the commercialism the ad men drum up, but of times in my life I look back on with an almost holy solemnity; times that proved to me at least that the birth of Jesus may be of all birthdays the one most worthy of celebration.

I remember a Christmas party a bunch of NDSCS faculty friends and their wives had at om" place back in the early 80's. It was a ?‘help the host” BYOB and a snack (my invention) type party to keep any of our wives from having a lot of heavy preparation. They were usually on a Friday night and often at the drop of a hat. At this particular party there was much animation and sharing and the imbibing of copious amounts of adult beverages. At most such parties, most of the guests began to trickle out for home by around 1:00, but this particular night there was one who totally lost track of the time, and we finally got rid of him at around 2:00. Or so we thought, but then the doorbell rang and Joe McCurnin always the last to leave, poked his head in the door, “Gene, you gotta come out and see this.” Well, why not? I threw on a coat and Joe led me out into the street. “Listen,” he said. “What is it?” I said. “Nothing, listen,” he whispered. And then I got it. It was an absolutely silent night. Huge fluffy snow flakes wafted down around the street light. We both just stood there spell-bound by a silence so profound you wanted to whisper to avoid breaking the sacredness of the moment. Finally Joe said, “I thought you'd dig this, being a poetry guy and all.” And he was right. It was one of those times when one just knew something holy was out there.

That night brought to my recollection another night with a similar holiness hanging over it. It was a Christmas Eve, and all of the Pinkney kids had pieces to say or parts to play in the program at the Fairmount Methodist church. I was always a wise man, usually bearing gold, and after the program, walking home through the snow-soft silent streets with “O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie” playing in my mind, I felt for the first time that sacred, almost tangible silence. Something somewhat like that atmosphere is described in “Hamlet,” by one of the guards of the castle: “Some say that ever 'gainst that season comesl Wherein our Savior's birth is celebrated / The bird of dawning singeth all night long / And then they say no spirit dare stir abroad / The nights are wholesome; then no planets strikel No fairy takes nor witch hath power to charm,/ So hallow'd and so gracious is the time.”

Other times when the presence of the Holy Spirit could" be sensed include the candle light service at Bethel Lutheran Church and the Concordia College Choir's Christmas concert, which can at times be awesome. Nor can I leave out the numerous Christmas Eve services we used to have at the Assembly of God Church, just singing traditional carols, or hearing testimonies or doing praise and worship. Sometimes the Presence of the Lord was so weighty one had to sit down to keep from falling, “ so hallow'd and so gracious were those times” I These days of political division, rumors of war, and anarchic violence, we need more than ever the Grace that makes the Christmas season a time of healing, restoration, love, acceptance and forgiveness that crowns America's good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea. “So let it be written; so let it be done.”

Gene Pinkney, 12/ 23/ 19, For the Daily News uploaded 01-08-2020