(Christmas
2017: This homily was given on December 25, 2017 at St. Pius X Church,
Westerly, R.I., by Fr. Raymond Suriani.
Read Matthew 1: 18-25.)
[For the audio version of this homily, click here: Christmas 2017]
Was
Mac Davis a prophet?
Mac
Davis is an actor and a singer and a songwriter (many of us know that), but is he also a prophet? Or, more precisely, was he a prophet back in
1978, on the day in December of that year when his Christmas special aired on
network television? Some of you might
remember it. The program was called, “A Mac Davis Special: A Christmas
Odyssey—2010”—and it was about the growing commercialization of Christmas. The story was set in 2010 (which, in 1978
seemed like a long time in the future), and it concerned a married couple
(played by Mac and actress Bernadette Peters) who were trying to deal with the
fact that December 25 wasn't celebrated as Christmas anymore. Christmas had been eliminated from the
calendar, and it had been replaced with a winter celebration that they called “Commerce
Day”—which was (not surprisingly) all about spending money, making money and
accumulating lots and lots of stuff.
Consequently,
December 25 was no longer about “giving”, it was about “getting”; it wasn’t
about saving your soul, it was about saving a buck!
I
remember seeing this program when it aired in 1978, and thinking to myself,
“This show had a pretty good message.
I’ll have to be sure to catch it when it’s on again next year.”
But
it wasn’t on the following year, or the year after that—or any year since! And personally, I don’t think that’s a
coincidence. I think it’s disappeared because,
for a lot of people who watched it in ‘78, the message hit close to home—really
close to home. It was a comedy that made
a very serious point about the dangers of materialism, and an equally serious
point about the real meaning of Christmas.
I
thought of this old Mac Davis Christmas special last week, when I heard the
results of a recent poll taken by the Pew Research Center. According to this poll, although 90% of
Americans and 95% of Christians claim to celebrate Christmas, the role of religion in their celebrations is
noticeably declining. And that’s a bad
trend—a very bad trend! In 2013, for
example, 51% of Americans said they observe Christmas as primarily a religious
(rather than a cultural) holiday, but this year only 46% said it. And the percentages are worse for
millennials. They’re much less likely
than other adults to say that they celebrate Christmas in a religious way.
And
so it should come as no surprise that, according to this poll, fewer people
nowadays believe in the historical accuracy of the Christmas story as it’s
found in the Bible. For example, in 2014
73% of those surveyed said they believed in the virgin birth of Jesus; this
year only 66% said they did. In 2014 81%
said they believed that the baby Jesus was laid in a manger, but this year only
75% said they did.
Changing
Christmas Day to Commerce Day seemed pretty far-fetched in 1978. It no longer seems that way in 2017. With the secularization of our culture that
we’ve seen in recent years—and which is clearly evident in this poll—I can
actually envision something like this happening in our country in the relatively
near future. That’s why I posed that question
at the beginning of my homily: Was Mac Davis a prophet in his 1978 Christmas
show? Was he predicting something that
will eventually take place?
I
certainly hope not!
Here
we see how important it is that we as Catholics keep our focus—our spiritual focus—during this holy season. We have to remind ourselves constantly of the
primary reason why Jesus Christ came into this world 2,000 years ago. And no, it wasn’t to help us save money at
Macy’s! He came to save us from the eternal consequences of our
sins! As the angel said to Joseph, “You
must name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”
His
name means “Savior”—and that’s what he was.
And still
is!
The
famous English writer G.K. Chesterton was once asked why he became a Catholic
at the age of 48. He responded by
saying, “To get rid of my sins.”
That
was a very good answer.
Perhaps
the reason why many people today ignore the religious dimension—and the
religious roots—of Christmas is that many people today either ignore their
sins, deny their sins—or try to rationalize them away.
They
don’t see the need to have a Christ-centered Christmas because they don’t see
the need for Jesus Christ—period!
Even
though they have that need.
And
so do we.
Which
is really what makes Christmas so special.
John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that he sent his only Son,
that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” Insert your name in place of “the world” in
that verse, modify it slightly, and it still will be true: “For God so loved Fr. Ray, that he sent his only Son, so
that if Fr. Ray believes in him he should not perish but have eternal life.”
I
don’t know about you, but I want eternal life with Jesus Christ a lot more than
I want a big screen TV from Walmart!
Jesus
came to make that life possible for all of us.
He said, “I have come that they might have life and have it more
abundantly.”
But
we need his forgiveness constantly in our lives in order to attain that
abundant life, simply because we sin constantly. That’s why we Catholics should thank God for
the gift of confession. This was the
sacrament that enabled Chesterton “to get rid of” his sins! Bishop Sheen used to say that when a priest
raises his hand to absolve someone in confession the blood of Christ is
dripping from his fingers (spiritually speaking, of course!). One drop of that precious blood can heal any
sin and every sin. It’s a shame when
people stay away from the sacrament because of pride or fear. They miss out on the greatest gift God has
given to us and to the world since the fall of Adam and Eve.
It’s
always great to meet someone who does appreciate the blessing of a good
confession—and then experiences it in a powerful way. A while back a man came into the
confessional, confessed some “heavy-duty” sins that had been weighing him down
for a long time; and then, before I gave him absolution, he said, “You know,
Father, this was really tough, but when I leave here I know I’m gonna be
flying.” (He meant that, too, in the
spiritual sense!)
And
he did.
The
next day I happened to run into him in town, and I said, “Are you still
flying?”
He
smiled and said, “Yes, I am!”
He
understood the gift.
I’ll
close this Christmas Day with a little meditation that I think summarizes the
message of this homily pretty well. I’m
sure some of you have heard it before.
It begins:
If
our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator.
If
our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist.
If
our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist.
If
our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer.
But
our greatest need was forgiveness, so
God sent a Savior.
My
brothers and sisters, if enough people come to believe that in the near future,
we won’t ever have to worry about Christmas Day becoming Commerce Day (or
anything else, for that matter). And, happily,
Mac Davis will be forever known to the world as a great actor and singer and songwriter—but
not as a great prophet.
Merry
Christmas.