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.