Christmas 2023

I am not preaching this Christmas, but if I were I’d be using this image:

Christ in the Rubble, Christmas Lutheran Church, Bethlehem, Palestine, 2023.

Christmas Lutheran Church in Bethlehem (the same Bethlehem where Jesus was born in the Holy Land) created this Nativity: Christ in the Rubble.

I had my students wrestle with this image. We had discussed at length the history of the region and decisions that have perpetuated conflict in the Holy Land when the war broke out in October. We have continued to pray for peace (among other things) when we start class each day.

So when I first saw this Nativity, I put the image in front of them one day for discussion and later made this topic one of the essay options on our midterm exam last week.

I told them that art is meant to provoke or inspire or maybe even both – but art’s intent is to stir a reaction and evoke emotion. So I asked them what this image of Christ in the Rubble stirred up in them.

What does it stir up in you?

I asked my students:

–Do you think this is an appropriate way to depict the Christmas story or not? (There’s not a right or wrong reaction – but explore why you feel that way.)

–What message do you think this Nativity is trying to convey? What is it calling us to do or not do? What promise (if any) is it trying to share?

-What role do you think art can play in our lives of faith, spirituality or understanding of the world? (Keep in mind that we have a long tradition of using art both in the Church and across many faith traditions, and for most of human history most people did not have the opportunity to learn how to read).

The responses varied (of course). Yet overall I was very impressed; not because the ones that wrote on this essay question reacted to it the way I had (there were very thoughtful opinions both for / and against if this Nativity as a good way to tell the story), but because they dealt with it theologically and dare I say: even pastorally. Students who either loved or hated this image talked about seeing Christ in the center of pain, struggle, death and the mess we make of the world and each other’s lives. Students on both sides of liking or disliking this Nativity discussed it as an image of hope in the face of violence and war. They wrote about art opening us to a bigger world to see things we often overlook or look past to see things from another point of view. They found it helpful to see Jesus at the center of everything especially when they didn’t understand all the factors involved at the heart of the ongoing conflict in Israel/Palestine, the political implications on both sides of the aisle for us here in the U.S. or how American media handles what we see and do not see on a daily basis.

What they understood was human suffering and our call to peace – even when peace seems out of reach or maybe even impossible.

They also reminded me of the One in the manger who is our peace.

In their responses many of them proclaimed good news where all we tend to see is where we disagree, how others get it wrong and who we are supposed to dehumanize, hate or be afraid of in this world. I am grateful for their heartfelt responses. My students offered much better sermons than I could have put together this year. I’m so proud of them and grateful for their witness.

If the church has a future (and it will, Come Holy Spirit!) it will be because thoughtful leaders like these students continue to love their neighbors and share the story – where God’s word to the people provokes and puts things to an end, where it inspires and calls us out of the rubble, and where Christ enters to make all things new.

I continue to pray for all my siblings in the Holy Land and hope you will too.

Peace to you and Merry Christmas. -GS

“He is our peace.” (Ephesians 2:14)

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