Christmas Story: Hope for "lowly and forgotten"

From the Lompoc Record
Dr. Bob Cornwall
Faith in the Public Square
December 24, 2006

Harry Truman said “the buck stops here,” while George W. Bush declared that he was “the Decider.” Such states exude strength and power, and it seems that the stronger and more powerful the leader is, the more apt we are to listen (and obey) to their pronouncements. As history has shown, the demagogue will try to manipulate our emotions and prejudices in order to control us, and the charismatic figure will seek to gain our acquiescence through a cult of personality.

Since today is Christmas Eve, it's appropriate to consider a different view of power. Tonight, many Christian communities will celebrate the story of a baby born to a young mother in a stable (Luke 2:1-20). The backdrop is an insignificant town in a backwater part of a powerful empire. When read against the stories of the greats of the ancient world such as Caesar, Alexander, and Augustus, it's surprising that we would pay attention to this telling of Jesus' birth. As Luke tells it, God chooses to speak to and through the lowly and the forgotten, not to or through kings and potentates.

In a passage that precedes the birth story, a pregnant teenage girl named Mary sings a song of praise to God; in this song, known as the Magnificat, Mary declares that God “has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly,” and God has filled the “hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty” (Luke 1:46-55). It would seem that God has a “preferential option for the poor.” (Click here to read the whole column)

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