“The Christmas Carol” (12/11/2024)

I am already looking for the movie “The Christmas Carol” on the show guides. It is my tradition to watch it at least once during the Advent and Christmas season. It has real meaning for me – living Christmas 365 days a year. It reminds me that we rarely know the invisible crosses others bear, but surely everyone bears their own. It reminds me that love is the answer regardless of the question. I guess you could safely say that I owe Charles Dickens a thank you.

I read the book, too, but I am more of a visual learner, and so I always watch the movie at least once. My favorite version is the 1984 film starring George C. Scott as Scrooge. I find that version to offer me the most convincing “conversion” of Scrooge. And that is why I love the story. It’s more about personal conversion than Christmas, about realizing what life is really about seeing into the lives of others, into the lives of those whose struggles are either invisible or easily ignored.

Advent is a time of preparation for the coming of Christ; put another way, Advent is a time for conversion, a time for setting down that which is not essential and picking up that without which we cannot live. It is a time for recognizing the essentials of relationship in our journeys, our relationship with our all-present and ever-living LORD as well as with our sisters and brothers. It’s a time for setting down “appearances” and picking up, instead, love lived out loud, love truly expressed in word and deed. It is a time for acknowledging with a heartfelt “Thank You, LORD,” for the love that was behind Christmas, the love that caused the Father to send His Son. It is a time for asking ourselves if we are ready for Christ coming again and “turning.” It is a time of conversion.

As we journey in faith, hope and love it is our responsibility to bring our whole selves to the journey, to honestly look at ourselves and our needs for change as we prepare for the coming of Christ. It’s always been more about preparing ourselves than decking out our homes. And the gift we are called to present to Christ is ourselves, a better and more loving version of ourselves.

Until tomorrow, let us all love well.