Maybe it's because her best friend is a stuffed lamb that 3-year-old Laurie is drawn to the lamb in every book about the Christmas story. Maybe it's just because lambs are fluffy, cute and more interesting than mangers and shepherds.
She would like "Away in a Manger" much better if the second verse were "The sheep they were baaing, the baby awakes" rather than the cows lowing. She doesn't know any cows that low.
We know that shepherds were part of the first Christmas, but whether camels were present is an open question. And the angels scared the death out of those who saw them. I don't think any Precious Moments angels had a part.
The heavenly host was an army, not a cheery, smiling grouping of collectible figurines. Just about every angel involved started conversations with "Fear not!" Seeing one must have been petrifying.
We like to arrange the Christmas story in warm, comfortable groupings --- like living room furniture --- to give us a cozy, hot-chocolate kind of feeling.
Sure, the underlying message of Christmas is of joy and hope. But plenty of uncomfortable elements adorn the story.
When Mary realizes what God's plan for her is, her prayer vibrates with horrific warnings to the rich.
He hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats . . . the rich he hath sent away empty.
In America even many of the poor are rich, by world standards. We feel poor if we can't manage to get little Susie the Britney Spears Barbie with karaoke ensemble or whatever the hottest new toy of the season is. Or if we omit someone on our ever-growing gift lists.
Somehow I don't think that "the rich he hath sent away empty" has anything to do with maxing out credit cards.
That prayer of Mary should send shivers down our Christmas cardigan-clad spines.
And have you ever looked at King Herod's No Child Left Behind act? Not a pretty part of the Christmas story. All the babies and toddlers of a town and surrounding suburbs are slaughtered in order to keep Bethlehem safe for incumbents.
So we stylize the story, like we do with much of the Bible. Tuck away the unpleasant parts, clean it up a little, avoid much direct contact and have it dribbled to us in homey little storybooks and "studies."
The Christmas story at full strength will humble and break us. That's uncomfortable. Much better to drape tinsel on it, repackage it, overarrange the songs that would take us back to it, so we focus more on harmonies and notes than on what the music points to.
The earthy, animal waste odor of whatever place held a manger for a crib contrasts nicely with the cinnamon-and-pine scent of candles on our rich, American sideboards.
The swaddling-stripped, makeshift garment Mary came up with is not featured anywhere in the latest L.L. Bean catalog.
Whatever Christmas Club bank account Mary and Joseph might have contributed to would have been emptied by the Caesar Augustus tax plan. They didn't even get a child tax credit! And no frequent-donkey miles were awarded for the long trip from Nazareth.
No, the story as it stands in its purest form is dangerous. It threatens to strike us down with the sheer force of wonder. We are likely to fall on our knees, as the carol says, or even on our faces, when we contemplate that the divine Word would so offer himself up in the human world.
"Behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world," said John the Baptist.
The Christ child is the main lamb of the Christmas story, the sacrificial lamb that escapes King Herod only to be offered up later, in our place.
Laurie and I will keep the lamb in Christmas. As for angel cows, drummer boys and calico camels, well, maybe not.
Allowed to stand uncutesified, unwrapped and undecorated, the Christmas story is the most potent on earth.
Donna Marmorstein All rights reserved 2003
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