Ahhh, from Joseph Mohr’s lyrics to God’s ears that it might be so, and soon. Can you imagine? Catch a flash of Christmas Future. Picture every last person on the planet celebrating the sacred nature of the whole creation, including themselves. Every heart serene and peaceful. Every eye sparkling with the radiance of the awakened state.

“Peace on earth, good-will to all” ... has come full circle from a fervent prayer in the illumined heart-mind of a fearless prophet to the daily bread of billions of grateful celebrants. The Christ Mass is merry!

Nobody’s cold or hungry. Nobody’s naked or homeless. Health care and education are universal. Right livelihood in a safe and nurturing work environment is available to everyone needing a little green energy. War, crime, terrorism, all forms of violence and abuse have succumbed to the planetary embrace of an enlightened code of conscious conduct and are no longer options in the arena of human affairs.

The Earth Mother is considered sacred. Her lands, trees, waters, atmosphere and bio-diversity are treated with our deepest wisdom and utmost sensitivity. Voluntary simplicity is the dominant lifestyle. All children and elders are respected and cherished and cared for with impeccable integrity. The role of parenting is honored as the planet’s most important human activity. Gender equality is taken for granted. Glass ceilings have long been shattered.

Prejudice and bigotry are found only in the Museum of Most Egregious Historical Ignorance. Commerce and Economics is practiced as if Mother Nature and people mattered. The Defense Department has been downsized to one musical unit mobilized every Fourth of July to honor Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Barney Fife is in charge of all law enforcement. All political decisions are made at a grass roots level the first Tuesday of every November at Beanstreet’s.

Newt Gingrich and Bill Clinton have been freeze-dried and now stand uncharacteristically silent in the Capitol Rotunda welcoming pilgrims touring the Smithsonian Institute of Amusing Political Anachronisms.

“The Donald” was successfully revived from cryogenic suspension but died of acute Mammon Withdrawal Syndrome soon after discovering that his flagship Atlantic City casino had been converted into the world’s largest Goodwill Store during his fifty year deep freeze.

An elderly widow made headlines in the Wall Street Journal when she donated her last $1.86 to the Betty Ford Foundation for Recovering Capitalists. Ted Turner’s recent contribution of 27 gazillion dollars to underwrite this year’s federal budget was briefly noted on page 38.

Forgive us, Father, for we have grinned!”

Really now, is all that truly so far off the charts? I think not. A little shift in the wind . . . a little waking up here and there . . . SHAZAM!. . . critical mass! So what’s it going to take to shove enough of us down the road of awakening to tilt the planetary head in the direction of a genuine spiritual renaissance?

An old Russian Tantric master identified one of the major hindrances to waking up that we could all stand to take a look at. G.I. Gurdjieff, one of history’s most gifted facilitators of the awakening process, constantly reminded his disciples, “You do not realize your own situation. You are in prison. All you can wish for, if you are a sensible person, is to escape. But how to escape. If a person is at any time to have a chance of escape, they must first of all realize that they are in prison. So long as they fail to realize this, so long as they think they are free, they have no chance whatsoever.” Can you give that a big “A-men?”

If you buy that, and I encourage you to give it a fair appraisal, the next reasonable step would be to ask, “What kind of prison is Gurdjieff referring to? What form of bondage is seductive and subtle enough to imprison me in a myth of freedom?”

Try these. Airtight belief systems impervious to the winds of change. Puritanical codes of conduct that never learned how to laugh. Cherished opinions etched deep into dogmatic granite. Emily Post masquerading as the Good News. Or, as Jesus would put it, “Old wine, long turned sour, in ancient, dried-up wineskins.”

Gurdjieff’s prisons. Classic ideological blinders. Rigid belief systems, so tenaciously embraced as gospel they become totally unavailable to any challenge or evolution, including the Jesus invitation to experience the ease and lightness of non-judgment as a life-style.

Those so possessed, sadly, forfeit their sense of humor to a chuckle deprived fanaticism dedicated to “saving” every soul out there that deviates, even slightly, from their cherished points of view. They have all the answers regarding what’s virtuous, decent, appropriate, acceptable, right, desirable, fair, just and politically correct. They have also clearly defined everything that’s sinful, decadent, lewd, dirty, crude, rude, obscene, wrong, unacceptable, inappropriate, undesirable, evil and politically suspect. They are walking, talking, breathing yardsticks of righteousness and indignation. They’ve got a standard for everything. There’s not a single human behavior that escapes the scrutiny of their diligent eye for blasphemy. These folks are not happy campers. They will, however, provide you plenty of opportunities to check out your sense of humor.

You’ve probably noticed them. I know I have. I meet one every time I look in the mirror. We’ve all been there... and remain part of that family of unhappy campers to one degree or another. As Pogo so insightfully observed, “we have met the enemy and he is us." Tough to acknowledge, but you can put the wisdom in the bank. As Edward Benson observed, “How desperately difficult it is to be honest with oneself. It is much easier to be honest with other people.” Another cell in Gurdjieff’s prison.

And “honest” with other people we are. The unexamined arrogance (the unseen prison) of our critical analysis rears its head most commonly in the arena of human relationships. Churches, for example, and we are no exception, are convenient proving grounds for Gurdjieff’s observations. How could it be otherwise? Churches like ours attract many seekers, each embracing their own unique point of view regarding things religious, metaphysical, social, political and environmental.

How absurd to expect anyone, much less everyone, to leave a life-long collection of beliefs, attitudes, values and unenlightened thinking patterns at the door when they show up at church. When I remember to include that bit of wisdom in my appraisals of ongoing situation and circumstance, I open the door to freedom from the bondage of judgment ripened into righteous, pious indignation.

So, when the petulant one approaches me after the service on Sunday to tell me how “uncaring” and “insensitive” it was to keep him there for an hour and a half, I pray that I’m not going to get stuck in “false witnessing” by characterizing him as “whining” or “nit-picking” or “attacking me.” I pray I can remember to tell myself the Truth going on in that moment. I pray I can be observant enough to recognize old patterns of unenlightened thinking and choose not to invest agreement in their distorted conclusions. I pray that I will remember to think of him as a child of God, here with me in the school of life, sharing with me the probability that he’s got some heavy addictions in the areas of time urgency or worship correctness. I pray I can remember to let him know I appreciate the courage it took to be candid and authentic with me. And I pray that this is the year he truly hears the wisdom in the Third Zen Patriarch’s observation that “the Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences.”

I pray I can remember to do all that and at the same time remember to be thankful that, at least this time, I’m not stuck in the same prison he’s stuck in... the Gurdjieff prison... the one he doesn’t know he’s in. The unenlightened state that keeps him chained to the fantasy that his frustration was born in the length of a church service.

Getting freed up from the “false witness” trap is the science of the soul. It is a discipline of discovering all the ways of being that extend your love to the world, while discarding all the ways that do not. As freedom from unenlightened discrimination liberates your creative life force, you may be inspired to sing, dance, write, make art or otherwise celebrate. Don’t let your day job get in the way.

Can you believe it? Here again! 365 installments of living, laughing, crying, dying and otherwise practicing our humanity brings us round again to that day on the calendar dedicated to celebrating the spiritual feast the season invites us to enjoy... a bounty of love, peace and goodwill for each other and every atom of God’s Creation.

A celebration of similar intent has long accompanied this time of the year when the days shorten, temperatures drop and the harvest is safely stored away. It wasn’t always called “Christmas.” The holy-day we observe as the birthday of the beloved prophet, our Wayshower, Jesus Christ, has its roots and festive nature deeply embedded in the Roman winter solstice celebration honoring the sun god, Saturn. The Saturnalia was celebrated annually from December 17th to the 23rd and featured feasting, gift-giving, and songs. All courts were closed, no one was convicted of a crime, and all men - slave and free, rich and poor - were equal for the week. Romans were governed only by the three laws of the Priest of Cronus during the holiday...

1. All businesses shall be closed except bakeries, cookeries, and those which tend to sport and solace and delight.
   
2. Anger, resentment, and threats are strictly forbidden.
   
3. No discourse shall be either composed or delivered, except it be witty and lusty, conducing to mirth and jollity.

• 1496 King Henry VII enacts an “anything goes” holiday policy allowing commoners to do anything they want to have a little fun, including playing cards which was strictly forbidden the rest of the year. Thanks, Henry, that’s getting way out there.
  
• 1543 King Henry VIII takes twenty-one Scottish nobles prisoner at the Battle of Soom Moss, feeds them Christmas dinner, then sets them free. What do you call that? Seasonal compassion? A slight perversion of the Jesus ethic to be sure, but at least it’s a start. Could it be that Braveheart lost his head over lousy timing?
  
• 1608 Jamestown, Virginia: Pocahontas rescues Captain John Smith from imprisonment by her father, Chief Powhatan, and the colonists celebrate America’s first Christmas. Wrote Smith in his diary: “We were never more merrie, nor fedd on more plentie of good oysters, fish, flesh, wild foule and good bread; nor never had better fires in England than in the warm smokie houses.” A rich example of a being practicing the wisdom of celebrating the doughnut rather than commiserating over the hole. Recognizing and expressing gratitude for the subtle, mundane examples of God’s generous Spirit is a graceful spiritual art that would serve any of us well in a season so often polluted by regrets over what we were able to give and disappointment over what we received.
  
• 1958 The satellite U.S. Atlas transmits a Christmas greeting to the world from President Dwight D. Eisenhower; “To all mankind, America’s wish for peace on earth and goodwill toward men everywhere.” And Jesus cheered, though I doubt He’s still cheering.
  I can see it now. God and Jesus are standing together right in the center of the cosmos. God puts His arm around Jesus and then points His finger right at Earth saying, “Son, we’ve got a real educational crisis going on in that spiritual kindergarten you started on planet Earth. After 2,000 years, they’re about even with the learning curve of a lemon. What’s it going to take for them to see they’re still trying to spell my name with the wrong blocks?”
  Now that’s a righteous inquiry and one we’d all be well advised to happily consider. What is it going to take for each of us, individually, to come to that place where the quality of our livings testifies powerfully that we have made a choice to truly be instruments of peace and goodwill for all who come our way? I’m convinced that the most profound Christmas gift any of us could give this or any Sacred Season would be our commitment to understanding and keeping His commandments with impeccable fidelity. “Oh come, all ye faithful!”
  
• 1968 Cape Canaveral; NASA workers sneak three bottles of brandy aboard Apollo 8 as stocking stuffers for astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell, and Bill Anders on the Christmas moon mission. Now how refreshing is that! A sense of playfulness cuts right through Houston control to provide a moment of sweet liberation from the deadly tension surrounding the earnest business of putting human beings into space and getting them back alive. In retrospect that’s not much different from the mission each of us is on. Cosmic astronauts, piloting spaceship Earth through the galaxy doing our best to remember that the only way we can come back is alive . . . tucked eternally away, ever so safely in the sweet bosom of our beloved Father/Mother God. “Away in a manger.”
  
• 1979 Seattle: The Boeing Company throws the largest Christmas office party in history at the 65,000 seat Kingdome; 103,152 people attend. I recognize that the math doesn’t work. Just consider it a west coast version of The Miracle on 34th Street.
• 1993 New York: Former “Queen of Mean” Leona Helmsley donates $25,000 to replace Christmas gifts stolen from a Manhattan homeless shelter. Ahhh! A contemporary Christmas Carol. Charles Dickens would be so pleased to see that the phenomenon of changed hearts and the Spirit of Christmas generosity is not necessarily fictional.
• 1994 Washington: First Lady Hillary Clinton leads reporters on a tour of the Christmas White House. Taking time out to respond to recent unseasonable remarks about her husband’s staff from House Speaker Newt Gingrich, she says, “perhaps we need to be more careful in our treatment of each other. I would hope that the Christmas spirit would take over the heart of everyone.”

May this blessed season find each of you shouting with Ebenezer,
“A Merry Christmas to everybody!”

May you experience the Grace of
sharing your abundance with those less fortunate.

May you give yourselves the gift of reconciliation
if you have shut any being outside your heart.

May you raise the spirit of everyone you meet along life’s way.

I thank God for the gift each of you adds to the sum of my days.
Merry Christmas !

~Chad