Peace on Earth

Our humanity is what we have in common but our cultural heritage is a gift each of us is given at birth. And unless we embrace that gift and value the power it is meant to bring to our lives, we cannot realize our full potential.  (Mary-Ann Kirkby)

As I began decorating the tree this Christmas, I wondered where the magic of that childhood joy I used to feel had gone. A German Christmas carol we always sang at this time of year when I was growing up took hold of me and wouldn't let go. I started humming the tune and got stuck on the words. On impulse, I googled it and up came a beautiful rendition of Alle Jahre wieder, taking me right back to those wonderful days. Not only that carol, but many others, one after another, appeared automatically.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOuRLRszIcc

I realized what a great gift my mother had given us by singing these songs with us, and I got my Christmas magic back again as I listened to the carols one after another, singing along in joyous abandon!  I remembered how we used to gather around a table on which my mother had placed a small Advent house with a candle inside. The light of the candle shone through the parchment paper windows of the little house. The house had 24 windows and one door. These represented the days before Christmas and the day we opened the door, it was Christmas. Each window had a Scripture verse printed on it and if we memorized it we received some kind of Christmas treat (candy, cookie, or an orange). Treats were few and far between in those days; we were refugees and had just arrived from a war-torn country to finally join our relatives in Canada (October 1952).

I still have that authentic Advent house. It is well used. The inside is blackened with smoke from many candles and some of the shutters of the windows are missing. The sides are taped together. On a trip to Europe a few years ago, I saw one just like it in a museum in Husum (northern Germany). They told me there were none available for purchase.

Although I have many positive memories of my first Christmas in Canada, I do recall one rather painful experience. We had dutifully memorized some Christmas recitations (in German) like we did every year, but when we recited them at the local Mennonite church Christmas program no one clapped. We were met with a wall of silence. We didn't know it at the time, but the church had recently decided not to use German in their worship services. It was the language associated with the war and identified us as the enemy. For years I suffered from stage fright because of this incident.

In Canada, many refugees will be experiencing Christmas for the first time this year and next. I wonder how we can make this a time of joyful remembrance for them in spite of all the sadness they have gone through. We hope they will soon adapt and enjoy the freedom their new home country offers. Acculturation will happen gradually but that time of adaptation will be very crucial to their well-being. In the meantime we want to affirm, accept, and embrace together with them their family traditions and their way of life. 

I have been reading a fascinating book about a refugee who defected to America in 1967. Her name is Svetlana Alliluyeva. She is Stalin's daughter. Here is an excerpt from the book jacket:

Born in 1926, Svetlana Alliluyeva spent her youth inside the Kremlin as her father's power soared. Eighty-five years later, she died alone and penniless in rural Wisconsin. Revealed here for the first time, the many lives of Josef Stalin's daughter form a riveting portrait of a woman who fled halfway around the world to escape her birthright.

In the Kremlin Svetlana had lived a privileged existence, compared to that of the starving masses (including our family) created by her father's ruthless regime. Her life was much like that of the average American--a comfortable home, good schooling, summer cottage vacations, etc. However, Svetlana was not immune to tragedy. She lost her mother to suicide, and her father's merciless purges claimed relatives as well as her lover who was exiled to Siberia. When she defected, she left her two young adult children behind.

Svetlana searched all her life for the kind of world described by the prophet Isaiah in the passage below, a time when the whole world will be at peace:

                               The wolf will live with the lamb,

                               the leopard will lie down with the young goat;

                               the calf and the lion will eat from the same trough
                               and a little child will lead them.

                               The cow and the bear will graze in the same pasture;

                               their young will lie down in peace

                               and the lion will eat straw like the ox.

                               Even a baby will not be harmed if it plays near a poisonous snake.

                               Neither animal nor human will hurt or kill on Zion, God's holy mountain.

                               The whole earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD
                               as the waters cover the sea.

                                                                                                           (Isaiah 11.6-9, alt.)

My challenge for 2016 is to work at keeping Isaiah's vision alive!