Eco-Justice Notes: Christmas is
subversive
by Peter Sawtell, Executive Director, Eco-Justice
Ministries
Date: 12/20/01 -- posted here on 12-22-01
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Christmas is a profoundly subversive holiday.
Millions of families gathering to open mountains of
gifts are not subversive, of course. But the central theological point
of this Christian holy-day is a direct challenge to the core assumptions
and values of our modern world.
Recognizing and believing the message at the heart of
Christmas could actually lead us to change our lives. We could find
ourselves called to confront the most powerful ideologies and
institutions of our day.
What is Christmas? It is the celebration of God
breaking into human history with a saving act of love in and through the
person of Jesus. At Easter, we can get tied up in questions of how that
saving love works. At Christmas, we simply rejoice in the wonderful fact
of Emmanuel, of God-with-us.
The remarkable proclamation of this celebration is
that God's saving love is poured out: * not only for the rich and
powerful* not only for the righteous (it is Santa who divides the kids
into naughty and nice) * not only for the folk of a particular nation,
geographic area, philosophical persuasion, or any other faction * not
only for humans ("God so loved the cosmos" is the language of
John 3:16)
Christmas reminds us that God comes among us to bring
Good News to all people, indeed, to all of creation.
What is so subversive about that?
Christmas tells us that (in the eyes and heart of God)
all people, all creatures, all parts of creation, have intrinsic worth.
We are all worth loving and saving, just because we exist.
God comes to us in a pure act of love and grace.
There's no exchange where we need to do something useful for God. We
don't need to prove our worth. We don't need to be better or more
valuable than any other part of the creation. God loves and cares for
each of us, just as we are.
That's not the way our world works.
We like to think that we are living in The
Technological Age, defined by wondrous advances in science. But even
more significantly, we live in The Economic Age, when our understanding
of the world, and all things in it, is shaped by economic perspectives.
People, other creatures, and "natural resources" are deemed to
be valuable, or not, for what they can provide to others. Much of the
time, both individually and institutionally, our relationships with
people and the rest of creation are grounded in the exchange value of
labor and commodities. The value of others is often defined in dollars.
There is more at stake in the difference between
economic worth and intrinsic worth than intellectual categories. How we
understand the worth of others shapes our morality and ethics.
The great anti-slavery movements of the 1800s were
driven by the moral passion of those who saw the intrinsic worth of
enslaved humans. That movement for freedom was driven by the radical
notion that all people -- however oppressed or despised -- have moral
standing because of their innate value. The abolitionists made clear
that people are not things to be bought and sold, used and abused. The
labor of people has economic value; the people themselves have intrinsic
worth.
The claim of intrinsic value in the lives of the
enslaved was clearly an attack on the economic system that brought
prosperity to regions and nations. Claims of intrinsic worth were
practical and philosophical threats to the status quo.
And the same is true today. If we take seriously the
premise of Christmas -- if we truly believe that God cares enough about
creation to come among us with saving grace -- then we will be called to
a different morality. We will be compelled to denounce systems and
ideologies that recognize only the monetary worth of what God so
profoundly loves.
This Christmas, I pray that God's loving perspective
on the world may break into our lives and our churches. I pray that we
may be transformed by the astounding proclamation of Christmas. I pray
that we will be compelled -- as a matter of our deepest faith and ethics
-- to love, protect and preserve God's valuable creation.
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Shalom!
Peter Sawtell, Executive Director, Eco-Justice
Ministries
Check out the Eco-Justice Ministries web site. (www.eco-justice.org)
E-mail Peter Sawtell. ministry@eco-justice.org
