Thursday, December 18, 2025

 

Dianne Gallagher  CNN

Jer 23:5-8   Ps 72:11-19   Mt 1:18-25 

With every passing year, I become increasingly convinced Christmas is political, and also that we desperately need it to be. I suspect this is something understood by Placide Cappeau, the author of the French poem "Minuit, chrétiens," which was put to music by American minister John Dwight and published as O Holy Night. The words we sing in this beautiful Christmas carol are now comfortably familiar, but the political and abolitionist message was controversial in the 1850. This was especially true of the third verse, which reads: Chains shall He break, for the slave is our brother; And in His name all oppression shall cease. Not exactly an easy lyric to belt out in church when the pews are filled with white folks who purchased and owned enslaved Black folks (and other white folks too poor to own enslaved people, but who none-the-less supported it). While the song was specifically written to be sung in Christmas eve services, many renditions dropped that verse entirely. After all, we wouldn’t want the church to get too political, especially at Christmas time. Christmas is a time for joy and fellowship and celebration; No need to dampen the mood, or ruin the sense of the church’s unity, with discussions about upending the entrenched power structures that oppress some people, for the political and economic benefit of others! Best to keep to only the more comforting lyrics.

I trust the extremely problematic nature of those 1850s sentiments is abundantly clear, and I wouldn’t want to draw a straight line from them to us. But I do wonder if we’re sometimes guilty of a different modern version of this—particularly as a denomination who prides itself on our “big tent church”. We value unity, and work hard to protect peace among us. That’s certainly not a bad thing, but I do think its worth considering if there are times our peaceful unity comes at the expense of our oppressed and marginalized siblings. This, friends in Christ, is why I think we need a political Christmas: to save both we who are oppressed and we who may act as oppressors.

Behold, the days are coming, declares YHWH when I will rise up for the house of David a righteous branch, who will reign as a true ruler and act wisely, and do what is just and right in the land. (Jeremiah 23:5) What will this anointed ruler do? He will rescue the poor when they cry out and the oppressed when there is no one to help them. He will take pity on the lowly and the poor, and will save their lives. God’s chosen one will rescue them from violence and oppression, and will treat their blood as precious. (Psalm 72: 12-14)

I think it’s temptingly easy to read these kinds of statements as metaphorical, and forget the very real and literal political realities in which both were spoken, and the way they upended power structures in their fulfillment. Jesus was born in Bethlehem, a town in Palestine was occupied by Rome then, and by the state of Israel now. Jesus was made incarnate, made literal flesh and blood, so that he could be God with us. Our own God dined with the sex workers, the disabled no one wanted to shell out money for, and ostracized foreigners, immigrants, and refugees. He prioritized the oppressed, criticizing (with great feeling!) the way the leaders maintained their money and status by oppressing the people their society pushed to the margins. 

When the psalms and prophetic verses speak about a new, just ruler coming for the oppressed, I think we’re tempted to consider them as metaphors or hope for only the afterlife. They’re much more literal. We pray your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven because we’re called to follow in Jesus’s way, bringing literal relief to the oppressed—which is always going to involve toppling literal systems of economic, social, and political power. It’s much easier to see how Jesus' birth and life went against the systems of power in his day, and much harder to see our own participation in the exploitation and oppression of marginalized people here at home. I’m rarely one for just going in for a penny, so I’ll dive all the way in for my pound: Let’s think about the social and political realities for us.

Here in Alberta, we have disability benefits being slashed for seemingly the umpteenth time in a handful of years. We are directing disabled people who can’t afford to live on $1900/month to MAiD (medical assistance in dying). We have legal human rights being taken away from queer and trans folks, and interference in both the classroom and the doctor’s office on those fronts. We have increasing incidents of racially-motivated violence—including local kids and teenagers bringing back slurs and Nazi salutes, copying the racist rhetoric they witness, often from adults. Minimum wage, originally created as the minimum livable wage, keeps families in poverty, and folks are literally working themselves into an early grave while corporate profits and income from investments soar. Numbers of unhoused people are increasing, while landlords buy additional income properties, and raise rent across all of them. We have local political movements copying our southern neighbours, who are ripping apart migrant families and placing them in “detainment” camps. Fascism is on the rise, but because we’re the frog being boiled, it's a lot harder to see—especially because we’re Christians, and a big part of the current political climate is being driven by Christian Nationalism. And that doesn’t even touch the genocide of the Palestinian people, and Canada’s involvement in it.

The Christmas story of a silent Joseph and a baby born in a manger in occupied Bethlehem to a back-water peasant brown-skinned couple (who would later become refugees)... it must have something to say to oppressed people today. That’s something I’ve been wrestling with these days: Is the gospel of Christmas truly good news for our marginalized and oppressed? Is it more than churchy toxic positivity that frees us from having to be honest about our own power structures? Is it more dubious theology delivered by regimes that smell more and more like Christian Nationalism with each passing week? 

The more I meditate on it, the more convinced I am that we need a political Christmas to save us from the equivalent of cutting out the uncomfortable conviction of that third 1850s verse. That’s why I chose this song, and why it’s featured heavily on my playlist this year. It’s not a traditional Christmas song, and it’s a little comfortable, but it helps me reframe the gospel of a political Christmas in a modern way.

Alyssa Visscher 

 

Things Jesus Didn’t Say  Ron Pope