Below is a column by Associate Pastor John Torgerson published in the Wisconsin State Journal on Sunday, December 9th.

Merry Christmas - Respectfully!

             The WSJ published a Thanksgiving guest editorial by Debi Ghate urging us to celebrate our selfishness on Thanksgiving.   I suspect that many would see this as an opening salvo in the Thanksgiving/Christmas culture wars.  In the spirit of equal rights for all, I wish use the same venue to get in the fray. But I also want to advance a suggestion for having some culture war civility.

             Ghate’s editorial encourages us to use Thanksgiving to celebrate the American story of earned accomplishment and to view the story of the early Pilgrims as an anachronism.   While I disagree with Ghate’s thesis, she is correct in associating Thanksgiving with stories.   I will go a step further and say that most worldviews are story-based.  The great religions are based on the ancient stories of Moses, Abraham, Buddha, Jesus and Mohammed.  A list of more recent “prophets” whose stories have influenced our culture might include Joseph Smith, Billy Graham, L. Ron Hubbard, Ayn Rand, Sigmund Freud, and Opra Winfrey.

 Stories have a way adding their DNA to ours.   What child has not imagined being the hero of a Saturday morning TV show?   The influence of stories on adults is no less real.  When Walt Disney released Bambi, sales related to deer hunting dropped to one sixth their former value.  Saving Private Ryan gave me a new appreciation for what our World War II veterans did.

             Even if we do not believe in an afterlife, I think most of us want to be immortalized by leaving behind a good story.    But even a full life span is not enough to create a good story from scratch.  We build our stories on the stories of others, beginning with the stories of our parents.  Those with a theistic worldview, build their stories on the hero of their religion.  For Christians, the hero, ostensibly, is Jesus.   Even a cursory reading of the first century letters of the Apostle Paul shows that the Jesus story informed the early Christians' lists of virtues and vices rather than any body of law.

             The Jesus story is unique because of grace – the unearned favor of God that affords opportunities to begin, or resume, a good story.  Ghate rejects grace and says that we should proudly proclaim, “I earned the good things of life that have come my way.”  Rather, my thanksgiving to God for good things involves trying to tell a personal story that is more like the Jesus story. 

             I promised a suggestion for civility in culture wars.  I propose that we do two simple things:  that we take advantage of opportunities to verbalize our own story and that we be ready to listen to someone else’s story.  This will be difficult in our sound-bite dependent society, but the peace and goodwill that could result will be worth the effort.  We should not feel guilty for wanting the other person to see life our way, but we shouldn't demand or expect it.  Worldviews are difficult, if not impossible, to change.

             So I say to you all, "Merry Christmas".   For most of my life, this traditional greeting has seemed rather insignificant.  But in the culture war milieu, I am more acutely aware that for me this greeting is an iconic expression of my belief that God visited our realm of space and time in the form of Jesus, and that His story deserves our full attention.  If I hear a “Humbug” I will respond, “That’s interesting.  May I hear your story?”

             Peace!