Editor’s note: Every family needs a support system, and this is especially true of Catholic families in a secularized culture. Kelly Henson is a writer, wife and homeschooling mother of four from Greensboro. Through stories and tips, she will hand you a dose of hope and show you that it’s possible to integrate a lively faith with every day family life in the modern world.
There is a great contest for our attention during the Advent season. Events crowd our calendar. Spare moments are spent searching the internet for the perfect earrings for our favorite aunt.
I went to a store before Thanksgiving and felt somewhat attacked with a barrage of “Jingle Bell Rock,” Mickey Mouse Christmas laser lights, and a troop of inflatable Santas wavering and leering from the top rack. Sometimes we reach Dec. 25 – which should be the beginning of 12 days of celebration – and we’re just glad that Christmas Day is over. Our world is thirsting for authentic joy, and it does its best to simulate the experience with thrill and novelty.
But, as Catholics, we have a better gift to give to our children at Christmas.
Did you look at Mars or any of the other proximate planets that were particularly bright this summer? Something is often most magical when it is just itself but surrounded by a little space and quiet. Christmas is very humble. God could have descended in a blaze of light, looking and behaving like a Roman god, and overturned the Roman Empire in an instant. But that is not His way.
He arrived, as the beautiful Christmas novena prayer says, in “a stable at midnight in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold.” He entered into our lack, not into our abundance. He came to heal and to connect, not to divide. Understanding this tremendous gift, what can we do in our families to prepare for this humble King? What will be at the center of our children’s imagination when they picture “Christmas” years from now?
My childhood memories of Christmas are filled with Nativity scenes. My mom collected them over the years: the delicate Holy Family with starched clothing on the mantle, the tiny crèche made of crystal, olive wood figures from the Holy Land, a white porcelain set ringed by candles, a colorful plastic set safe for small hands, and even a Nativity scene carved from a coconut. We lived surrounded by woods, and Mom would take time to cut boughs of frosted white pine, red-bejeweled holly and fragrant cedar to place artistically around the Nativity scenes throughout the house. In my child’s eyes, each little collection of figurines was magical.
I challenge you to take a moment to be intentional about your holiday traditions this year. Since our extended family has expanded significantly, we have grappled with this balance every year. What do we keep? What do we let go? How do we cultivate peace, purity and a spirit of anticipation throughout Advent? How do we keep Christ at the center of Christmas and use the 12 days afterwards to invest in hospitality, friendship, family and prayer?
Like my mom, I love for the Nativity to be at the heart of our holiday decor. We have a beautiful set that we add a figure to every year. The kids set it up with reverent anticipation at the start of Advent. Baby Jesus remains hidden until Christmas Mass (hopefully in a place we remember on Christmas Eve). During December, the kids select pieces of straw-colored yarn and add them to the manger every time they do something kind in secret. We hope that charity will make our hearts and our little manger a welcoming home for baby Jesus. After the baby Jesus figurine comes at Christmas, our Three Wise Men travel from one side of the house to the crèche. Occasionally, they get into amusing mishaps at night, Elf-on-the-Shelf style. The Wise Men arrive on Epiphany, when we process around the house singing “We Three Kings” and perform a traditional house blessing with chalk.
My kids still sing songs such as “Frosty the Snowman” boisterously around the house. We frost ninja-shaped gingerbread men, and a tipsy margarita glass glimmers on the tree. We don’t need to infuse every winter item with Christ or toss it into a sack like a religious Grinch. However, putting at the center Jesus Christ – the One who created us and loves us enough to die for us – sanctifies all our human joys and reminds us that He came into this world “so that they might have life and have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).
Our imagination is a powerful gift. As you find the traditions that enliven this gift in your family, deep change can happen in the hearts of parents and children. A sacramental imagination creates the bridge between physical objects and the spiritual realities they represent. I have found that if we contemplate the Holy Family together, we give God an opportunity to begin a paradigm shift in our families. Jesus, Mary and Joseph inspire us as we sit before the crèche to imitate their humble trust in the Father, and we too begin to understand the God who offers “peace to those on whom His favor rests.”
Kelly Henson is a Catholic writer and speaker who explores the art of integrating faith into daily life. She, her husband and their four children are parishioners of Our Lady of Grace Parish in Greensboro, and she has worked for more than 15 years with teens, children and families as a missionary, youth minister and teacher. She blogs at www.kellyjhenson.com.