It is the third week of Advent and the beginning of Hanukkah, and we’ve lost a beloved film director, two beautiful college students, and 15 Jewish Australians to violence all in one weekend. It’s as though we skipped over the baby in the manger and went straight to the Massacre of the Innocents. Part of the genius of the Bible is that it doesn’t minimize the bad parts. But Joseph flees to Egypt with the baby — becomes a refugee in a more, at that time, benign kingdom — and waits out Herod’s death. The baby grows up to transform the world. (For those who may cast a jaundiced eye on certain iterations of Christianity today, its combination of Old Testament justice and New Testament love nevertheless undergirds much of what we value in Western civilization.)
Meanwhile, Donald Trump is the perfect stand-in for mad King Herod — crazed, insecure, vengeful, murderous. At this darkest time of the year, we wait for the light and celebrate accordingly while we pray for the redemption that the Christmas story promises.
Kathe Geist
Charlemont