The First Christmas – Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan

Follow this link to a 12 minute video, described below:

“In The First Christmas Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan—top Jesus scholars and authors of The Last Week—help us see the real Christmas story buried in the familiar Bible accounts.

Basing their interpretations on the two nativity narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, Borg and Crossan focus on the literal story—the inner truth rather than the historical facts—to offer a clear and uplifting message of hope and peace. With The First Christmas readers get a fresh, deep, and new understanding of the nativity story, enabling us to better appreciate the powerful message of the Gospels.”

 

Light in the Midst of Darkness

Fred Plumer reflects on Christmas on 22 December 2014

For decades, I felt compelled to explain that December 25 was really not the date Jesus was born. I suspect I have ruined Christmas mornings for more than one parishioner. But I thought it was important… Over the last few years, I have begun to think that celebrating Jesus’ birthday on the same holiday of Sol Invictus or the Winter Solstice was actually a good idea and in some ways appropriate…

Jesus entered the world in a dark time in human history, particularly for his own people, the Jews…  few of us can even begin to grasp how hopeless and dark the world must have seemed to those oppressed people…

It was into this great darkness that Yeshua entered the world. In spite of his humble beginning, somewhere along the way he managed to bring a new light, a new perspective to many of his followers…

Christmas Quotes

Christmas is not just a time for festivity and merry making. It is more than that. It is a time for the contemplation of eternal things. The Christmas spirit is a spirit of giving and forgiving.– J. C. Penney (“Christmas Thoughts”)

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Christmas, my child, is love in action. … Every time we love, every time we give, it’s Christmas.– Dale Evans Rogers

St Andrew’s Carol

Come and see
the star in the sky
the spangle of angels
the spark in our eyes.

Come and see
the table prepared
the wine in new skins
the Seder bread.

Holy Families, Outrageous Possibilities

Imagine you’ve been sitting on the hillside, minding your sheep and your own business, when suddenly the angelic host appears and frightens you out of your wits. Then fast forward a bit—you’re running towards Bethlehem to see the new baby and his family.

Now, freeze frame again:

How do you see the Holy Family?  What do they look like?  “Ordinary”?—what does that mean?  Iconic?  A nativity scene or an artist’s impression?  Surrounded by shepherds and angels and animals, or isolated and on the run from Herod—or from dubious family members still unsure of Joseph’s wisdom in marrying Mary?  Perhaps you see a pageant—a filmstrip of images one after the other, screening numerous family scenes and mythologies and narratives. Hold them in your mind’s eye…

I have to differ!

In his “New Testament and Mythology”, Bultmann claims that “modern man is convinced that the mythical view of the world is obsolete”, that “all our thinking today is shaped for good and ill by modern science”, “the miracles of the new testament have ceased to be miraculous”, and—astonishingly—that “the mythical view of the world must be accepted or rejected in its entirety”.

I have to differ!