Digital Extra: The Journal's 175th Anniversary

07.21.2004

1944. Meaning of Christmas remembered in conflict

This editorial was published on Christmas Day 1944:

"For 2000 years the story has moved the hearts of men and women and stirred the imagination and wonder of children. A couple came out of Nazareth into Judea to the city of David called Bethlehem under order of Caesar in Rome to enroll. They could find no room at the inn and finally sought haven in a stable where in a manger Christ was born. The heavens gloried and the Three Wise Men, following a star, brought presents and angelic choirs sang of peace and of good will.

"No other story, with its simplicity and humble beauty, is etched so deeply in the memory and consciousness of the Christian world as this of the birth of the Lord. Around it ceremony and custom have grown, and the festival season is associated with joy and happiness; and a radiance, bespeaking the finest and noblest in man, glows through the holiday. Then families are reunited, gifts exchanged, smiles wreath the faces of the tired and the weary, children are in a heaven of delight, and everywhere there is merriment.

"The trappings of Christmas are so compelling, the simple dignity of the tale of the Christ child so heart-warming, that we are likely to forget the meaning of this birth in a manger in Bethlehem.

"This year the meaning presses in on us more than do the adornments. We cannot be merry when our hearts are filled with sorrow or foreboding. The sound of guns clashes with the sweet melodies of the carols. Christmas this year is a reminder, not a joyous fact. Our thoughts are deeper; they are in distant lands; they are on the realities because the realities are so close to all of us. And they bring us to the meaning of the birth of the Child in the faraway country of Judea.

"That meaning is the highest that has yet been conceived and because it is the noblest of man's nature it will never die. The Child was born that He might sacrifice His own life to redeem His brethren from evil. Is there a more sublime idea? Is there a purer concept?

"But evil persists and man struggles against it, by sacrifice and by character. That is the conflict of an imperfect world. That is the battle to which we are born heir. We cannot escape it so long as we wear our mortal clothes.

"This year we are more conscious of evil than ever because it has been abroad in the world in more vigorous and venomous force than previously in the long recorded annals of man. The evil that has emanated from the wicked and perverted minds of bad men menaces the faith that has always stood in its challenge. The men who have gathered this monstrous force have denied that there is good, that there is beauty, that there is loveliness and freedom. They have scorned the teachings of the Lord born in Bethlehem and have put their trust in cynical and material things and in an outworn god.

"And because this evil is so gross and powerful, the world is called upon for greater sacrifice to destroy it completely. We did not succumb to this evil but we are fighting it and men are dying so that some day -- and may that day be soon -- beauty and truth, grace and dignity can again be restored and children can gather on Christmas not with uncertain and fearful eyes but with clear and untroubled gaze to hear the story of the Redeemer of Man. Again the world is being redeemed through sacrifice because of evil. Our prayer this day is that the sacrifice shall not be in vain."