It’s the most miserable time of the year!
With each passing year, I despise Christmas more and more. It is such a perverse holiday. We celebrate the birth of a humble poor carpenter with gluttony and greed!
I ask you — how much time have you spent this holiday season, or any holiday season for that matter, letting others know that their existance on this planet matters, that they are thought of, are cared about? That is what the season is supposed to be about — reaching out to other human beings and letting them know that their existing matters. Jesus gave the most precious gift of all to show others that he cared — his life. How many of us are willing to give our lives, or even part of our lives, to our fellow human beings? Very few I am afraid. How many people are willing to stop and help that stranded motorist, or show a kindness to a lost traveler, or engage in a conversation with a stranger or even a not-so-stranger? Very few. Somewhere in the crass commercialism, the greed, gluttony, and narcissism of our society, we have lost our humanity.
It is the simple things that defines our humanity. Spending an hour drinking a cup of coffee with someone with no destractions. Really wanting to know how someone is doing when we ask, instead of feeling obligated to ask. Being human means having a soul, and the core belief the we are supposed to be celebrating this season, the lesson that Jesus taught us, is that as humans we are expected to touch others’ souls, to extend acts of kindnessness to other human beings because it is the right thing to do, it is what God wants us to do, and we show God that we love Him when we touch others’ souls, when we respect their humanity, when we show that they are a welcome and wanted part of God’s family, that they have value.
I’ve always wondered whether or not anyone would give a care about me if I didn’t have obligations as a spouse, father, employee, and co-worker. If I were just an anonymous dude, without any job or family or obligations, would anyone even notice that I was alive? Would anyone at all ever reach out to me, to touch my soul?
When I was sick back in October, I fell into a deep despair. The whole time I was sick, no one called to see how I was doing. I felt completely and utterly alone in the universe. I did not feel at all like a human being. If I had died, no one (ooutside of my kids) would have known. Even my employer was too distracted, too narcissistic, to care. After all, I am just a replaceable cog in the labor machine.
Every year, all I ever want for Christmas is for someone to reach out and spend some time with me. Not very much time, but just some time. All I want in that time is a simple, undistracted conversation, just to know that someone out there thinks that I have some value in the universe, that I am a human worthy of giving a care about. Every year, I never get this one simple thing, and every year, it causes me great despair. It is such a simple thing, but yet it eludes me so. Is there something wrong with wanting to feel wanted, needed, important, if only for just a few minutes? I am starting to think that such a simple thing has become an impossibility to achieve, and that thought makes me even sadder.
