The Days After Christmas

By David Samuel McCalmont

Setting aside for a day what goes for politics in these anguished times, let's refer to Christmas trees, caroling, cookies, and what it means to be jolly. First, allow me to begin with an awkwardly lengthy quote from Gilbert K. Chesterton, the 20th century's most acknowledged (Roman Catholic) Christian philosopher. Here's something he said about Christmas 100 years ago in one of his weekly newspaper columns published during the customary “Twelve Days of Christmas”:

“Being happy is not so important as having a jolly time. Philosophers are happy; saints have a jolly time. The important thing in life is not to keep a steady system of pleasure and composure, but to keep alive in oneself the immortal power of astonishment and laughter, and a kind of young reverence. This is why religion always insists on special days like Christmas, while philosophy always tends to despise them. Religion is interested not in whether a man is happy, but whether he is still alive, whether he can still react in a normal way to new things, whether he blinks in a blinding light or laughs when he is tickled. That is the best of Christmas, that it is a startling and disturbing happiness; it is an uncomfortable comfort. The Christmas customs destroy the human habits. And while customs are generally unselfish, habits are nearly always selfish. The object of a religious festival is...to find out if a happy man is still alive.

“A man can smile when he is dead.

Composure, resignation, and the most exquisite good manners are, so to speak, the strong points of corpses. There is only one way in which you can test his real vitality, and that is by a special festival. Explode crackers in his ears and see if he jumps. Prick him with holly and see if he feels it. If not, he is dead. Or as he would put it, is "living the higher life.”

I'm convinced that this is one of those things even the modern Christian world tends to get wrong about Christmas. Every year there are numerous articles spewing forth from religious media sources urging us all to “keep Christ in Christmas.” It occurs to me, however, that “keeping Christ in Christmas” might not be the entire problem. After all, "Silent Night" is the most covered song of all time – far outdistancing Bobby Helms's "Jingle Bell Rock" – with over 26,000 different versions of it on Spotify. Most of the irreligious among us recognize that Christmas originates with the story of a baby born on a winter's night in Bethlehem (and that our religiously neutral government recognizes this act in history as warranting a paid day off from laboring). The issue comes down to once we put “Christ in Christmas,” we tend to be merely happy about it, as opposed to uproariously jolly about it.

At some point in our adult lives, we've formed a habit of practicing a stoicism about Christmas. We smile around the dinner table, attend a few Christmas church services, and maybe spend some private moments contemplating the wonderous babe in a manger and pondering the cosmic significance of it all 2,000 years later. But it doesn't knock us for a loop that the babe is there. After all, the Feast Day of the Nativity is a commemoration of an event that billions of people believe actually took place. Of course, the child is in the manger.

But it should surprise us, don't you think? It should make our hearts feel full and our chests ache with delight. It should trigger an uncontrollable joy that manifests itself in uproarious laughter, to perform a couple pranks perhaps, a voice too loud for comfort, a few too many hugs, kisses, and spirited aperitifs, followed by an out-of-key carol sung outside a neighbor's home.

When we sing "Joy to the World", this is the kind of joy I mean. Not a superficial joy, but an obnoxious and uncomfortable joy. One day – December 25 – can't suffice to contain all this joy. It must spill into the days following. The tradition surrounding the “Twelve Days of Christmas” goes back more than 1,400 years to the Council of Tours in 567 A.D.

So, don't just have a Merry Christmas. Have a jolly good Christmas filled with laughter and delight. Allow yourself to be surprised by the gifts, the Bethlehem manger scene, the Christmas tree, the bad-for-your-waistline edibles, the joyous carols and – go ahead – a couple alcoholic potions (if you're of age and not driving). Let your heart be full and your eyes be bright. If you can do that, you're well on your way to celebrating the season the way it has historically been kept.