AWAY IN A MANGER – A Christmas CARD – By Ernest Macintyre
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NO CRIB FOR A BED
Both during Christmas festivities as well as prayers of thanks in the season, a mediating thought can be that God appeared on earth amongst the poor. Why? There are some suggestive indicators from which a design may be worked out. It was probably a recognition that the great multitudes on earth were these materially unfortunate people . It is not that the more fortunate classes were neglected by The Lord but as the Bible quotes Jesus as saying in Luke 18:25 that “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God” It is also in the Qur’an of Islam. The “Eye of the Needle” was in fact a narrow gateway into Jerusalem. Since camels were heavily loaded with goods and riders, they would need to be un-loaded in order to pass through. Therefore, the analogy is that a rich man would have to similarly unload his material possessions in order to recognize the transcended message of God. Not impossible but more difficult.
So, amongst the multitude of the poor was the preferred place to initiate a transcendent spiritual signal, which is outside the human experience, as was the event with God and the virgin Mary, with Joseph understanding and accepting the trandence. The experience that Joseph had would probably have led to separation proceedings with a man of the upper classes. God knew where first to appear, to begin the process that would spread widely across.
The centrality of the poor is found in other faiths too. Apart from Islam and others, in Buddhist philosophy the significance of the Buddha’s bowl is that in conditions of poverty the swallowing and digestion of the four noble truths is not possible, and the feeding of the poor is not a matter of charity. ” In Buddhism giving food to those who do not have is not considered charity but a way for people to connect to their spirituality. It is a law of nature in Buddhism, conceived in philosophical thought, not an affair of good conscience The Bowl is one of Buddhas unspoken sermons. The sermon on the mount with Christ feeding five thousand people has a similar association.
Helping the poor is much visible in Sri Lanka, so this short piece about the chosen poor in the origin of Christmas and its interreligous associations is but a thought . So I conclude with a possibly irrevernt thought of Oscar Wilde . “ It is much more easy to have sympathy with the poor than it is to have sympathy with thought”
WITH GREETINGS AND BEST WISHES FOR THE SEASON AND NEW YEAR.
NALINI AND MAC
