What Happens When the Christmas Baby Grows Up?

By Michael Patrick O’Brien–

I truly do love Christmas.

It is easy to love Christmas, I think, even for non-Christians. The simple tale of a baby born in humble settings, wrapped in swaddling clothes and placed in a manger has a universal meaning that can cut across geographic, ideological, religious, and cultural lines.

It is an optimistic holiday, full of joy and hope, of peace and possibility, of light. It is a story of love. And to quote lyricist Hal David and composer Burt Bacharach, “what the world needs now, is love sweet love, it’s the only thing, that there’s just too little of.” The world is full of love for the Christmas baby. Christmas love is easy.

Yet, the Christmas baby eventually grows up, and then the matter gets a little more complicated. For many reasons, some good and some bad, we struggle to love the baby who is too big for the manger and who no longer fits into the familiar swaddling clothes.

What started as love turns to dislike, indifference, and even hate.

We shoot the Christmas baby, often a total stranger to us, in a Texas church or during a country western concert on the Las Vegas strip. We shot over 3,500 of them in 2017 in Chicago alone.

We taunt the baby, and run over her with our car in Charlottesville. We objectify and sexually harass the Christmas baby over whom we have superior power.

We behead the Christian baby, demonize the Muslim baby, condemn the baby who loves someone of the same sex, kill the black baby in police custody and falsely accuse all law enforcement babies of racism.

Of course, these are only the most dramatic and provocative examples from national and international news headlines.

More commonly, in our daily lives, as December turns to January and so on, our love for the Christmas baby becomes a distant memory.

We fail to notice, or step over, the cold, hungry, drug-addicted, or homeless baby on the streets.

We disdain the Christmas baby who is different from us, be he a Democrat or Republican, or be she black, white or brown, or be he Catholic, LDS or atheist, or be they gay or straight, rich or poor.

We mock or shun the Christmas baby who works just down the hall from us. We gossip about the baby, highlight his or her mistakes, make up stories about the baby and laugh at the Christmas baby’s expense.

We fail to say “I am sorry” to the baby we offend or “I forgive you” to the Christmas baby who offends us.

And on and on and on.

Yes, loving the Christmas baby is easy, but thereafter? Not so much.

I do not think we will ever resolve what makes us sad in this world until we learn to sustain our love for the Christmas baby for longer than just a few days at the end of each calendar year.

This holiday season, let’s give each other a real gift, the one we all want and the one we all need. Light the lights, exchange the presents, bake the cookies and eat the roast turkey…let’s love and celebrate the baby born on December 25. And then let’s also love him or her as the Christmas baby grows up during the years that follow.

After all, who is this Christmas baby? You and me.

“What the world needs now is love, sweet love. No, not just for some but for everyone.”