10 Days of Christmas Memories
The other day a friend and I were talking about Christmas and she remarked "I've always thought of Christmas as a women's holiday, since it's about birth." She does have a point; although I think parenting is and should be an equal-opportunity responsibility, pregnancy and childbirth are still exclusively women's work. Last Sunday in my sister-in-law's ward I had the opportunity to listen to a fascinating talk on the spiritual symbolism of birth. The woman giving the talk works as a doula and she drew many interesting parallels between birth and gospel principles. For example, she talks about Christ's statement in Gethsemane as being similar to the transition statement ("I can't go on") that many women make during labor when they are needing extra support for the final push. I also liked the fact that she mentioned that she always felt that we did Mary a disservice by viewing the birth of Christ as something clean and sanitized. Mary is always demure and serene; she seems more like an angel than a real flesh-and-blood women.
Now, I'm not thinking we actually have to act out the birth of Christ during our Nativity pageants. Birth is private for a reason; it's sacred. We believe that the soul of man is formed in the uniting of body and spirit, so what could be more sacred than the moment in which a living soul is formed? In our modern society we tend to be squeamish about bodily functions; like I said, I think they do deserve to be kept private and intimate, but I think we tend to view "private" as equal to "shameful". If you search the Bible, there are numerous references to birth, nursing mothers, and sexual union as symbols of our relationship with the Lord. God doesn't think giving birth or nursing a baby is in any way gross or shameful.
Both my babies were born in the summer so I've never had an infant at Christmas time. I have however, been pregnant for Christmas. With my first baby that mostly meant that I was nauseated and grumpy. However, there were moments of grace as well. I remember one time when Mr. Fob and I were driving away from the temple after completing a session. We were listening to the soundtrack to the movie The Preacher's Wife and Whitney Houston was singing a song called "who could imagine a king?". I've sometimes thought songs like that one and "Mary Did You Know?" are a little weird, because obviously Mary had received a witness from an angel that her baby was special. At the same time however, I realize that I've often lost track of the divine in my own children. I forget that my children come from God; I forget that they are special spirits trapped in little bodies. I think I like Christmas because it reminds us that we are divine beings having a mortal experience. All of us, even Christ, had to come to Earth to receive a body and all of us have some divinity within us.
Now, I'm not thinking we actually have to act out the birth of Christ during our Nativity pageants. Birth is private for a reason; it's sacred. We believe that the soul of man is formed in the uniting of body and spirit, so what could be more sacred than the moment in which a living soul is formed? In our modern society we tend to be squeamish about bodily functions; like I said, I think they do deserve to be kept private and intimate, but I think we tend to view "private" as equal to "shameful". If you search the Bible, there are numerous references to birth, nursing mothers, and sexual union as symbols of our relationship with the Lord. God doesn't think giving birth or nursing a baby is in any way gross or shameful.
Both my babies were born in the summer so I've never had an infant at Christmas time. I have however, been pregnant for Christmas. With my first baby that mostly meant that I was nauseated and grumpy. However, there were moments of grace as well. I remember one time when Mr. Fob and I were driving away from the temple after completing a session. We were listening to the soundtrack to the movie The Preacher's Wife and Whitney Houston was singing a song called "who could imagine a king?". I've sometimes thought songs like that one and "Mary Did You Know?" are a little weird, because obviously Mary had received a witness from an angel that her baby was special. At the same time however, I realize that I've often lost track of the divine in my own children. I forget that my children come from God; I forget that they are special spirits trapped in little bodies. I think I like Christmas because it reminds us that we are divine beings having a mortal experience. All of us, even Christ, had to come to Earth to receive a body and all of us have some divinity within us.
Comments
"And Mary was great with child but had to walk on a donkey all the way to Bethlehem. I think it would be very uncomfortable for a woman who was so far along to travel on a donkey. Sister JetSet, you're that pregnant, can you imagine having to ride a donkey like Mary?"
Me: "....."
I read a statement by Chieko Okasaki once where she was talking about Mary. She talked about the angel appearing and then Mary taking off for several months. She speculated that she spent so much time with Elizabeth, because she was the one person who knew and understood. Mary had to go back home knowing that the angel had appeared to nobody but Joseph and that she would, no doubt, have been in for many uncomfortable glances, comments and judgments. The angel didn't tell her neighbors that her name would be honored above all women. That her son would be the savior of the world. Just as her birth would have been a normal, human experience, so would the social trials that accompanied her pregnancy. The scriptures give evidence that this is all the case. Christ is never referred to as the son of Joseph, but sometimes as the son of Mary. Talmage teaches that this is evidence of the fact that his neighbors always saw him as a bastard-child from a forbidden relationship. We can't even understand the stigma this would have been to him.
My middle boy just turned three. The year he came it was just two weeks before Christmas, and I've never felt as close the Savior and his mother as I did that year. It was almost my best birth--like little Pirate couldn't wait to get into our family. He was on time (my others were a week + late), came in the fewest number of hours with the least amount of medication. I had a dear friend to help with by birth who then took some beautiful pictures . . . I still love to look at those pictures and marvel over the miracle of my Christmas baby.
Thankyou . . . thankyou. . . thankyou for the reminder about the purpose of this season.