Back to fowednesday

Finding Holiday Gratitude in a Chaotic World

Christmas and Hannukah gratitude is not about pollyannish positivity, but a realistic recognition that, even despite evils, goodness comes as a gift.
By Anton Schauble
Finding Holiday Gratitude in a Chaotic World

December 25, 2024 07:27 EDT
user comment feature
Check out our comment feature!
visitor can bookmark
Fair Observer
SUBSCRIBE / INVITE FRIENDS / BROWSER
DECEMBER 25, 2024

Anton Schauble

Chief of Staff to the Editor-in-Chief
Dear FO° Reader,

I will confess, when I sat down to write this letter a week ago, I was not having a good day. It was a day with more than its fair share of strife and contention — both personal and political. To clear my head and find inspiration, I visited the chapel of perpetual adoration at my local Catholic church.

I had ideas of what I would think about, but I wanted to let the message come to me, not to make it up myself. And indeed it came as soon as I knelt down before the exposed Eucharist. Two words: Thank you.
 
Hortus Deliciarum. The Birth of Christ. 1180 AD. 

Today is Christmas, when Christians celebrate the miraculous birth of Jesus. Tonight also begins Hanukkah, when Jews celebrate the rededication of the Temple of Jerusalem after it had been desecrated by the tyrannical Greek king Antiochus IV Epiphanes. Each is a festival of a sudden and unexpected liberation, and, most fundamentally, of gratitude.

In the second century BC, the Jewish people inhabited just one corner of the Seleucid Empire, the most powerful of the successor states to Alexander the Great. Although by the reign of Antiochus the empire was a shell of its former self — having recently lost a devastating war with Rome — its vast wealth and military might greatly dwarfed Judaea. Yet, after Antiochus attempted to suppress the Jewish religion, they rose in revolt, and against all odds, they won. For the first time in history since the Kingdom of Judah had lost its independence, an independent Jewish state was created. To the people of the time, it must have seemed nothing less than a miracle.


The First Book of Maccabees (considered part of the Bible by Catholic and Orthodox Christians) narrates the jubilation that followed the liberation of Jerusalem and of the Temple:
  • At the very season and on the very day that the Gentiles had profaned it, [the new altar] was dedicated with songs and harps and lutes and cymbals. All the people fell on their faces and worshiped and blessed Heaven, who had prospered them. So they celebrated the dedication of the altar for eight days, and offered burnt offerings with gladness; they offered a sacrifice of deliverance and praise.
Jews continue to observe this eight-day celebration every year, starting on the 25th day of the month of Kislev.

By the close of the first century BC, Judaea had again fallen under foreign domination, this time from Rome. Rome ruled through a proxy monarch, Herod the Great. The Gospels tell us that it was under the reign of Herod that the promised Messiah, the deliverer and king of the Jewish people, was born. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus’s mother Mary sings this song of praise:
  • My soul magnifies the Lord,
  • and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior…
  • he has put down the mighty from their thrones,
  • and exalted those of low degree;
  • he has filled the hungry with good things,
  • and the rich he has sent empty away.
  • He has helped his servant Israel,
  • in remembrance of his mercy,
  • as he spoke to our fathers,
  • to Abraham and to his posterity for ever.
It is the song of someone who has long endured suffering, who is well aware of her own helplessness, and who experiences liberation not as her own conquest or victory but as something gratuitous, a child, a gift.

Gift. Few other words are so synonymous with Christmas and Hannukah, which have become the biggest gift-giving holidays of today’s culture. On other holidays we strengthen social bonds by eating together, or by marching together, or by singing together, but on these holidays, we give gifts. Why? Because we have received gifts.

It is gratitude that calls to our minds the frequency and the magnitude of good in our lives. A year ago I wrote in this newsletter that the antidote to despair is not escaping into lightheartedness but recognizing that the good and the beautiful are profounder and bigger than evil. A sense of gratitude shows us how.

Gratitude for religious freedom, for all freedom; gratitude for peace and for material comfort, when we enjoy them. When we do not, gratitude for the sheer gift of life, even if we be bereft of everything else. Persecuted people throughout history have celebrated Hannukkah. Destitute people around the world today celebrate Christmas. In the words of perhaps the second most read author at Christmastime after St. Luke, Charles Dickens:
  • They were not a handsome family; they were not well dressed; their shoes were far from being water-proof; their clothes were scanty; and Peter might have known, and very likely did, the inside of a pawnbroker’s. But, they were happy, grateful, pleased with one another, and contented with the time.
Each of us has so much to be grateful for. Our talents, our education, our families and our friends. This is the time to remember them not just as goods, to be appreciated, but as gifts, for which to give thanks. A gift is a good that is not necessary; it is gratuitous, spontaneous. And nothing that comes to us has happened by necessity. Our parents might have happened not to cross paths, or the Earth might have been just a little bit closer to or farther from the Sun, and humanity would have never evolved. So, everything we have is a gift.

I am grateful for all of this, and I am grateful for you, dear reader. Your faithful attention and your support are what keep Fair Observer going. We are, after all, an organization that relies exclusively on your gifts of money and time. Thank you.

I wish you a merry Christmas, a happy Hannukah and a very happy new year,

Anton Schauble
Chief of Staff to the Editor-in-Chief


Hanukkah Lights, Wikicommons
We are an independent nonprofit organization. We do not have a paywall or ads. We believe news must be free for everyone from Detroit to Dakar. Yet servers, images, newsletters, web developers and editors cost money.

So, please become a recurring donor to keep Fair Observer free, fair and independent.
Donate Now
Fair Observer
Read from anywhere
App Store
About Publish with FO FAQ Privacy Policy Terms of Use Contact

Comment

0 Comments
Newest
Oldest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Support Fair Observer

We rely on your support for our independence, diversity and quality.

For more than 10 years, Fair Observer has been free, fair and independent. No billionaire owns us, no advertisers control us. We are a reader-supported nonprofit. Unlike many other publications, we keep our content free for readers regardless of where they live or whether they can afford to pay. We have no paywalls and no ads.

In the post-truth era of fake news, echo chambers and filter bubbles, we publish a plurality of perspectives from around the world. Anyone can publish with us, but everyone goes through a rigorous editorial process. So, you get fact-checked, well-reasoned content instead of noise.

We publish 2,500+ voices from 90+ countries. We also conduct education and training programs on subjects ranging from digital media and journalism to writing and critical thinking. This doesn’t come cheap. Servers, editors, trainers and web developers cost money.
Please consider supporting us on a regular basis as a recurring donor or a sustaining member.

Will you support FO’s journalism?

We rely on your support for our independence, diversity and quality.

Donation Cycle

Donation Amount

The IRS recognizes Fair Observer as a section 501(c)(3) registered public charity (EIN: 46-4070943), enabling you to claim a tax deduction.

Make Sense of the World

Unique Insights from 2,500+ Contributors in 90+ Countries

Support Fair Observer

Support Fair Observer by becoming a sustaining member

Become a Member