Christmas Every Day

The Gospel of Luke (2: 8-18) tells the story of the announcement of the birth of Jesus to local shepherds and their visit to the Holy Family. “And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the fields keeping watch over their flocks by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not; for behold I bring you tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you: Ye shall find the babe wrapping in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which has come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us. And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger. And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told to them concerning this child. And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.”

Theologians have often remarked on the importance of the choice of shepherds as the first humans to be told of the birth of the Saviour. Shepherds were notoriously dirty, infamous for their neglect of ritual cleanliness of body and utensils; their testimony, like that of thieves and extortionists, was not acceptable in court. The angels’ visit to these debased characters seems to stress the universality of the Christmas message and the social inversion implicit in the Incarnation — the King of the Universe born in an animal shelter; the good news given first to shepherds.

 This exaltation of the humble has been the subject of drama and song ever since. Church liturgies have long honoured shepherds; the Office of the Shepherds at Rouen re-enacted the story before the midnight mass. In Poland the midnight mass is called the Shepherds’ Mass and shepherds’ pipes are often played during the service. In the south of France special masses see lambs brought in by sherpherds and placed near the altar. Pastoral drama, stories of the shepherds’ journey to see the Holy Family, is a big part of the Christmas season around the world. In Italy shepherds come down from the hills before Christmas to play their bagpipes before shrines, in churches and on the streets. Carols that celebrate the role of shepherds include the English “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night”, the French “Berger, Seccoue ton Sommeil Profond” and the German “Stille Nacht”.

The fourteenth-century mystic St Bridget of Sweden whose spiritual revelations about the Nativity were important in shaping medieval depictions of the events said that when the shepherds first encountered the Holy Family they wanted to know the sex of the child “for angels had announced to them that the saviour of the world had been born, and they had not said it was a saviouress”. When Mary showed them that the baby was a boy they rejoiced and adored the child.

Today Christmas Eve celebrations in Bethlehem are held in Shepherds’ Field where the angels made their announcement but various denominations disagree over the exact site.

The Seven Joys (and Sorrows) of Mary were a popular theme in medieval art and didactic literature. This song is based on a fifteenth-century English folk poem and was often sung by poor women who went door to door during the Christmas season with a vessel cup bearing images of the baby Jesus and Mary.

The first good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of one;
To see the blessed Jesus Christ
When he was first her son:

Chorus:
When he was first her son, good man
And blessed may he be,
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
To all eternity.

The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of two;
To see her own son, Jesus Christ,
To make the lame to go:

The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of three;
To see her own son, Jesus Christ,
To make the blind to see:

The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of four;
To see her own son,
Jesus Christ, To read the Bible o’er:

The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of five;
To see her own son, Jesus Christ,
To bring the dead alive:

The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of six;
To see her own son Jesus Christ,
Upon the crucifix:

The next good joy that Mary had,
It was the joy of seven;
To see her own son,
Jesus Christ, ascending into heaven.

Christmas in Greece is entering a new era. The decorations, food and customs are becoming increasingly globalized and resembling Christmas in western Europe or North America and where once Christmas was a quiet spiritual time with little commercialization, there is now an increased tempo and flashiness, at least in the urban centres. Despite this, Greece retains many unique customs from its past.

A penetential Advent season in Greece, the Fast of the Nativity, begins on November 17 but preparations for Christmas accelerate on December 6, the feast of St Nicholas. Nicholas in many countries is a quaint gift-giver; in Greece he is the national patron saint and the special protector of sailors who perform devotional ceremonies to him on his day. Christmas trees, which were once rare in Greece, are now becoming more common (though often artificial) and are set up in mid-December. (Before the popularity of the tree many Greeks decorated model ships at Christmas time or kept a sprig of basil wrapped around a wooden cross.)

Christmas baking is important in Greece and are number of productions are indispensable: loukoumathes, honey dough balls, kourabiedes, sugar-coated shortbread, melomakarona, dipped in syrup and rolled in ground nuts, and Christopsomo, the round Christmas bread that is the centre-piece of the Christmas Eve meal. Kouloures are Christmas breads that are made to indicate the family’s profession: a plough shape for a farm family, a sheep for shepherds, etc.(Some of these cookies are saved for the children who go door to door singing kalandas, the beautiful Greek carols which are often accompanied by the sound of the triangle and drum. )

Where it was once customary for most Greeks to open their presents at the New Year, many are now following the western custom of doing so on Christmas Eve or Christmas morning. The main course at the Christmas meal is changing as well. Roast pork was once the invariable highlight with many rural families raising the pig themselves for just this purpose but nowadays the turkey is making its appearance on Greek tables. Disappearing too are the rituals of the pig slaughter and the marking a cross on the children’s foreheads with the animal’s blood. The Christopsomo though remains an unchanged and essential element of the meal.

On New Year’s Eve more carolling takes place as children sing hymns to St Basil (whose feast is January 1) and are rewarded with treats and money. St Basil’s cake, the spongy Vassilopitta, is eaten after a ceremonial division in which portions are ritually allocated to the saint, various family members and the poor. A coin is baked into the cake and the finder is considered lucky for the coming year — if it is found in the piece for the poor the coin is given to charity. The next day gifts are distributed, a sumptous meal is served and the “Renewing of the Waters” takes place when new “St. Basil’s Water” replaces the old year’s water in jugs.

January 6 is the last major celebration of the Christmas season in Greece and marks the Theophany of Jesus, the descent of the Holy Spirit upon him at his baptism. Greek bishops carry out the Great Blessing of the Waters by carrying a cross, tied with a sprig of basil, and throwing it into a river, lake or sea in token of Christ’s birth and baptism. The cross will be retrieved by a diver; sometimes there will be competition for the honour of finding the cross as luck accrues to the one to return it to the bishop.

No account of Christmas in Greece would be complete without a mention of the folk belief in the Kallikantzaroi. These are subterranean monsters who emerge during the Twelve Days of Christmas to torment humans — they are angry that their year-long work to gnaw away at the tree that supports the world is thwarted by the birth of Jesus at Christmas. In their rage they will come down the chimney and perform little acts of nastiness, such as souring the milk, urinating in the fire or forcing folk to dance to exhaustion. They can be deterred by keeping the Yule log burning throught the period, burning old shoes, or hanging hyssop and a pig’s jaw. The Blessing of the Waters finally drives them back underground for another year.

Among the buildings destroyed in the September 11, 2001 collapse of the World Trade Center skyscrapers is one that is little talked about, despite being the oldest in the area, dating back to about 1830. Just south of the Twin Towers, separated from the complex by Liberty Street, stood the Greek Orthodox Church of Saint Nicholas which was crushed by the collapse of the South Tower when no one was inside.

In 1916 a group of Greek Orthodox from New York founded the congregation of the Saint Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church in the southern tip of Manhattan; at first the faithful gathered for worship in a hotel restaurant on Morris Street, until in 1919 five families raised $25,000 with which they bought a tavern at 155 Cedar Street to convert it into a church. The four-story building was built in the 1800s as a residential apartment building.

The new church began to function as a place of worship in 1922 and at first was located between two other residential buildings, then when the neighborhood was demolished to make room for the World Trade Center, the church found itself to be an independent building with the entrance pedestrian on the north side, the one facing the towers, and parking on the other three sides. Since its foundation, the community of Saint Nicholas has been an old-calendarist and only since 1993 has it adopted the Gregorian calendar.

The church was only 6.7 meters long, 17, 11 high and inside were kept relics, small bone fragments, of San Nicola di Bari, Santa Caterina d’Alessandria and San Saba Archimandrite which had been donated to the community by the last Tsar Nicholas II and which obviously went missing in the collapse of the towers. Because of the presence in this church of a fragment of the body of St Nicholas, the saint was known as St. Nicholas of Myra (where some say his bones still lie), Bari (where the bones pilfered by Norman pirates in the 11th century lie), and Manhattan.

After 9/11, Saint Nicholas parishioners joined the community of Saints Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Brooklyn where they remained for more than twenty years until July 2022, when the new Saint Nicholas, built beginning in 2014, it was consecrated and inaugurated on the southern side of the same block that housed the previous building. The new church was designed by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava and, due to the four towers at the top, is inspired by Hagia Sophia and the Church of Our Saviour in Chora, both in Istanbul.

The new Saint Nicholas Church opened in 2022

Most of the information in this post was found on this website (in Italian) devoted to 9/11: https://undicisettembre.blogspot.com/2023/05/la-chiesa-chiesa-greco-ortodossa-di.html?fbclid=IwAR0NCLxpKuXK-7B5VWP3boYBnkp-dhMtoYe2-K7f1njFsmIC2Xsbs0HojcE

Christmas is the time of year when the news media is desperate for some new take on the holiday and innumerable pressure groups are quick to appropriate the season to advance their cause. PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) is among the cleverest of these organizations when it comes to crafting click-worthy advertisements.

One of their toughest challenges has been to make the Christmas turkey, one of the ugliest and stupidest species of fowl, into an object of love and pity. Santa is always an attention-grabber but nothing says “look at me” like a naked woman.

PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, is an advocacy group known for its attempts to outrage the sensibilities of the non-vegan majority. In 1996 they convinced the National Park Service to remove the reindeer from the annual Mall Christmas pageant and in 2003 members dressed as Santa and an elf confronted fast food company executives at home and coming out of a Christmas Eve church service. Those tasteful folks who gave us “Beef: It’s What’s Rotting in Your Colon” and “Your Mommy Kills Animals!” also ran a campaign in 2003 entitled “Santa Isn’t Coming This Christmas” in which they claimed that the glass of milk children leave out for the gift-bringer could give him more than he bargained for:

“Hey, kids! Is the milk that you’re leaving out for Santa sending his “North Pole” south? It could be that “Jolly Old Saint Nick” can’t get his jollies because milk is bringing him down. The fact is, milk can cause impotence by clogging the arteries and slowing down the blood flow to all organs, and hardening of the arteries can make it a blue, blue Christmas for the 30 million North American men who suffer from erectile dysfunction.”

A rather shriveled Santa Claus was portrayed peering down the front of his trousers and the kiddies were urged to turn to soy “milk” as a yummy alternative.

Oaxaca, Mexico is famous for its “Night of the Radishes”. On every December 23, the Noché del Rábano, local giant radishes are carved into elaborate shapes depicting characters in the Nativity story, Aztec gods or animals; prizes are awarded for the most creative while dances, firework displays and a huge Christmas fair take place.

This hipster crèche features a Joseph with a man-bun taking a selfie. The Magi drive on Segways bearing gifts from Amazon. The stable is solar-powered and the cow eats only gluten-free feed. 11

In the city of Mérida, Venezuela, a fascinating local custom is the La Paradura del Niño, or The Standing Up of the Christ Child. Here the Nativity scenes in homes are particularly cherished; some are table-top size, some are room-size with all of Bethlehem portrayed in the Venezuelan context — the landscape is mountainous and divided by rivers. The figures often look like local people. On Christmas Eve the Holy Family is placed in the scene with the Wise Men nearby and moving closer daily. On New Year’s Day the tradition dictates that the baby Jesus must be moved to an upright position and stay there until Candelaria (February 2). If a friend or neighbour sees this is not done, the baby may be kidnapped and the family who neglected their duty must hold a parandura party for the kidnappers and friends. 

This consists of choosing godparents for the Niño— they will not only bring home the baby in a basket or handkerchief but arrange for the musicians, candles, fireworks and refreshments. The procession consists of first of fireworks boys, followed by the musicians who will be mute until the baby is found, a pair of teens as Mary and Joseph, children as shepherds singing a carol about searching for the baby and, lastly,  the godparents. When the candle-lit procession get to the house where the baby is stored, it is handed over to the kerchief and its god-parents and the joyous music breaks out. All march home joyfully where the party awaits after the baby is replaced standing up. Little kids may offer a poem of welcome, women will say the rosary and then all eat, dance and drink until dawn.

What would Christmas be without leprechauns as Wise Men, bringing gifts of gold, shamrocks, and Guinness?