Sorry About Your Birthday, Jesus

One can only imagine how disappointed Jesus was with his birthday this year – but He’s probably used to it by now.

Despite his wish list being quite small, and consisting of things that require little effort and even less expenditure, He awoke on Christmas morning, his birthday, to find only token presents – wrapped gaily in insincere good wishes and empty rhetoric – instead of those items that would have warmed His heart.

The saddest part of it all is that there is no excuse for not giving Him what he really wanted. He’s been asking for the same things for over two thousand years. And ironically, it is those who claim to know him best who continue to ignore what He most desires, year after year.

Unlike most Christmas gift recipients, Jesus would have been happy with socks and underwear – given to those who need such basics, like the homeless and the truly poor.

He would have smiled with pleasure at the sight of a stuffed animal, a small toy, a doll – placed in the hands of a child whose parents can’t afford to buy such luxuries for their little ones.

He would have gladly done without hearing the words Merry Christmas if he could have listened instead to the words, “Tell me how can I help you, and I will do what I can,” spoken around the world in every language.

He wanted us to remember that as we do to the least among us, so we do unto Him. What He got was people gorging themselves on expensive meals while food banks ran out of donations and had to turn the hungry away.

He wanted us to be our brother’s keeper. What He got was our brothers being kept in places like Gitmo, continuing to be tortured and abused even on the holiest of days.

He wanted us to keep His name in Christmas. What he got was shopping centers full of people spending their money only in stores that displayed cheap, light-bedecked nativity scenes, smugly insisting that was sufficient to honor His name.

He wanted us to mark His day by giving to those in need. What he got was the homeless sitting on cold street corners, holding out their empty hats, unnoticed, as shoppers scurried from one store to another purchasing gifts meant to impress rather than demonstrate the true spirit of giving.

He wanted us to celebrate His birth by sharing whatever largesse we may have with others. What he got was yet another round of pink slips for workers, while CEOs gleefully banked their multi-million-dollar year-end bonuses.

He wanted those who have sinned against Him with their hypocrisy, their arrogance, their greed, their war-mongering, their intolerance, their bigotry, their hatred, and their corruption of His Word to vow to change their ways, and go and sin no more.

What He got was a reinterpretation of His Word to include these things as having been part of His teachings all along – teachings that have simply been adjusted to allow for the sanctioning of torture, the waging of war, the slaughter of innocents, and the glorification of the Almighty Dollar above all else.

For those who still remember them, the words delivered to the world on the day of His birth were, and still are, something to strive for: Peace on Earth, and Goodwill Towards Men.

Unfortunately for Jesus, and for the rest of us, many of His so-called followers just don’t approve of this message.

Nance Greggs