Christmas is a season of the imagination. We say that
Christmas is for children. Maybe that’s because their imaginations are richer
and more active than ours are. Children can still imagine a magic sleigh that
flies through the air pulled by eight tiny reindeer (nine, if you count
Rudolf). Children can still imagine a white Christmas, even in Las Vegas.
Children can still imagine shepherds coming to the manger, three, wise kings
traveling over “field and fountain, moor and mountain” to visit the newborn King,
and that an angel asked a Jewish peasant girl if she would become the mother of
God.
Immediately after the story of the angel Gabriel’s
announcement to Mary that God was inviting her to be the mother of “the Son of
the Most High”, Mary left Nazareth and went to visit her cousin Elizabeth. When Elizabeth greeted by saying, “Greetings,
favored one. The Lord is with you,” Mary responded with the Magnificat.
My soul doth
magnify the Lord : and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
For he hath regarded :
the lowliness of his handmaiden.
For behold, from
henceforth : all generations shall call me blessed.
For he that is
mighty hath magnified me : and holy is his Name.
And his mercy is
on them that fear him : throughout all generations.
He hath shewed
strength with his arm : he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of
their hearts.
He hath put down
the mighty from their seat : and hath exalted the humble and meek.
He hath filled the
hungry with good things : and the rich he hath sent empty away.
He remembering his
mercy hath holpen his servant Israel : as he promised to our forefathers,
Abraham and his seed for ever.
I especially like the phrase, “He hath scattered the proud
in the imagination of their hearts.” Mary herself was no slouch at imagination.
She imagined that God would come to help of his people Israel, that God would
put down the mighty from their seats and lift up the lowly and meek; that God
would fill the hungry with good things but send the rich away with empty
bellies.
In one his best known songs, former Beatle John Lennon also
invites us to imagine:
Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today...
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...
Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...
I like John Lennon, and I used to like the song “Imagine”
until I began to think carefully about what Lennon was saying.
I really like the bit about
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace…
Imagine no possessions…
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world…
But frankly, I think this song shows Lennon’s lack of
imagination. First, he seems to buy into the idea that religion is responsible
for all the world’s problems. Now to be perfectly honest, and if we just do a
superficial investigation of things, there seems to be some support for that
idea. After all, wasn’t religion responsible for the Crusades, the Inquisition,
the “troubles” in Northern Ireland, the tension in the Middle East between
Muslims and Jews, and the tension in India and Pakistan between Hindus and
Muslims?
I don’t think so. I believe in all those instances religion
is the excuse for violence, not the reason. The terrible crimes of the
Crusades, the Inquisition, and so on, were not committed by nice people who
would have lived in peace with their neighbors had they not been religious.
They were committed by bad people who would have been responsible for murder
and mayhem regardless of what they believed or didn’t believe.
On the whole, religion helps more than it harms. Religion
gave us Gandhi and his philosophy of nonviolent resistance to tyranny; it gave
us Martin Luther King, Jr., and his inspiring call for people to be evaluated
by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin. Religion
gave us Mother Teresa and Albert Schweitzer, and I could go on and on.
John Lennon gave us some great songs, but his world is flat,
colorless, one dimensional.
I believe there is a heaven above us, and although I have
serious doubts about a hell down below. However, I do believe that our actions
have consequences, both here and in eternity.
I think Mary’s song, the Magnificat, beats John Lennon’s
“Imagine” hands down in the, well, in the imagination
department.
Long before John Lennon, the prophet Mary sang:
He hath put down the mighty from their seat and hath exalted
the humble and meek;
He hath filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he
hath sent empty away.
Long before John Lennon, the prophet Isaiah sang,
Learn to do right; seek justice.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.
Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
plead the case of the widow.
Long before John Lennon, the prophet Amos sang, “I hate, I
despise your feasts, but let justice roll down like waters and righteousness
like an everflowing stream.”
Why do you suppose that God “scatters the proud in the
imagination of their hearts”?
Well, what is it that the proud were imagining? Being proud,
their imaginations were probably mostly concerned with themselves. Fourth
century theologian Augustine of Hippo said that the human heart is curvatus in se, curved in upon itself.
If we’re honest with ourselves, we know that Augustine was right. We are
selfish; we want the world to revolve around us, and we do everything in our
power to make that happen.
We imagine more power and money for ourselves. We imagine a
world arranged to suit our needs and desires.
So when Mary sang, “God hath scattered the proud in the
imagination of their hearts,” she wasn’t talking about someone else, she was
talking about me… and you, too.
What is that you are imagining this Christmas? Are you
imagining a new car, a new house, a bigger bank account? Are you imagining a
trip to Tahiti or a cruise to the South Pole? There’s not a thing wrong with
any of that, but this Advent I’d like to join the prophet Mary in imagining a
very different world.
Imagine a world in which religious militants don’t kill innocent
children in their school in Pakistan.
Imagine a world in which police officers are not targeted
while carrying out their responsibilities.
Imagine a world in which black mothers and fathers do not
have to weep because their children are suddenly and unjustly taken away from
them.
Because if we imagine these things, then maybe, with God’s
help, we can build a different world, a world that more closely resembles
Mary’s song.
I’m not sure, but it’s possible that our Roman Catholic and
Eastern Orthodox sisters and brothers have put too much emphasis on Mary. I
just don’t know. But I do believe that we Protestants have paid too little
attention to Mary. Maybe part of the reason we have done that is that she
frightens us. Her uncompromising obedience to God is so different from our
halfhearted obedience. Her boundless faith is a far cry from our doubts and
uncertainties. And most of all, her song about God’s fierce and uncompromising
justice troubles us, because we are so reluctant to imagine a world in which
the mighty are brought low and the meek and humble are raised up; the poor and
hungry are filled with good things, and the rich are sent away with empty
bellies. Because we ARE the powerful, and we ARE the rich.
