I was surprised when one of the officers of the International Education Center of Shenyang Aerospace University here in China inquired about our religious affiliation. I suppose, she was concerned that we are properly greeted this Christmas season, it being of religious significance to many in the foreign teaching staff.<\/p>\n
On display among our staff is evangelical passion, high Catholic dramaturgy, Quaker \u201csimple gifts,\u201d Presbyterian confidence, all quite familiar to us having drank deeply from its wells.\u00a0 Nipponese colleagues are oblivious to Kyodan oikumene\u2019s lording guilt and moralism on life and pleasure; young Calvinist Hanggul capitalists spread bulgogi around while bells jingle in Seoul\u2019s luxuriant shopping malls, and an Indo-Aryan descendant of the Persian plateau has esoteric habits from Down-Under, but there is something fresh about the blatant commercialism that attends China\u2019s celebration of Christmas.\u00a0 My quiet sentiment goes with Bolshevik colleague who does not \u201cbelieve any of that.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n
Whatever luggage one brings to this festive season, the common global denominator these days is the cynics\u2019 Christ Ma$$ as a Chamber of Commerce affair rather than a moment of destinal reflection, communal meditation and individual accountability.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In my life\u2019s journey, on Christmas of 1968, the Apollo 8 mission sent photos of the blue planet rising from the pockmarked lunar landscape.\u00a0 Suddenly, the chorister\u2019s For unto Us a Child is Born took on an existential question of identity, vocation and lifestyle.\u00a0 My communal heritage threaded through the Chanukah story of Moses\u2019 leading the exodus from Egypt Pharaoh\u2019s bondage, wandered in Sinai, and of the chosen people, only Joshua was allowed to cross the Jordan.\u00a0 Centuries later, the sentiment will be repeated by those carted out by the Assyrians when they wailed, \u201chow can we sing to Zion by the rivers of Babylon?\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n
Followers of the Christos personalized that story with their own Yoshua Ibn Nazareth, who wandered through Palestinian dry hills before confronting the illusory powers of Jerusalem and was granted the ignominious award of a Roman crucifixion.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That story in Christo Rei post-Constantine spun the Christ-mass story from the nativity scene to the power of the empty tomb, and a sacrificial life vocation against the backdrop of the obedient Magnificat and three eastern potentates\u2019 genuflecting meekly in lowly Bethlehem. <\/p>\n
Europe\u2019s Medieval period crowned the image of living the-way-life-is (YHWH) into the imperial throne, sending the hero Jesus to glory, and rendering the proletarian Iesu inaccessible to the masses. \u00a0The monastics settled in the ministrations to mother Mary while the nuns pined for a sanctified walk with the beloved in the garden alone!\u00a0<\/p>\n
The story of the Greek\u2019s \u201clife force\u201d logos, for all its attendant cultural dressings (sophistry, propaganda, mythology, metaphor, public relation, spin), was singularly clear about its message on human identity, vocation and lifestyle.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Identity is unequivocal: \u201cFrom dust you came, to dust you shall return.\u201d The supreme affirmation was firm: \u201cthou art my son (sic) of whom I am well pleased.\u201d\u00a0 Not unlike the fact of our birth, when Dad\u2019s winsome 200 millionth sperm won my life\u2019s lottery, and Mom\u2019s ovule-lutionary chose me from a myriad of possibilities attest to decisions freely already made from the outset. \u00a0We are, in Christ-mass imagery, incarnate.\u00a0 And how dare we let such identity go to waste!\u00a0<\/p>\n
Vocation is unmistakable: \u201cThis is my body, broken; my blood, spilled out. Take, eat and drink, all of it.\u201d\u00a0 My brokenness is my wholeness, to be embraced totally, and the spilling of one\u2019s being unconditionally expended.\u00a0 The crucified carpenter of Galilee asked his followers \u201cto go do likewise.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cNo love is greater than this,\u201d the voice of mystery intones, \u201cthat one gives his life on behalf of another!\u201d\u00a0 Vocation is total expenditure, for the other!\u00a0 Not accumulation of wealth in banks, or assets in Garapan, or acquisition of power in capital hill and the capitol, will sate the human quest for significance and meaning.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Lifestyle is nothing but sheer freedom.\u00a0Paul who came after the \u201cfirst among many brothers (sic)\u201d admonished the Galations: \u201cIt is to freedom that we have been called.\u201d\u00a0 Not authority but authenticity. The lifestyle of free ambiguous choices turns out to be the ecclesia\u2019s (church) vision and mission.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n
Now, the global communion has transcended the cross and the crescent, the sutra and the chant, the silence and the taiji, the bread and wine, and we have since taken to tutoring Zhongguo students in the lingua franca of the new global order.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So when I wish one and all a Merry Christmas, one might hang on to the image of the magical manger and the angelic newborn babe in Europe\u2019s medieval art, but it is the triune concern of identity, vocation, and lifestyle (my teaching curriculum, I might add), that gnaws at everyone\u2019s heart, to which we now call the CNMI\u2019s attention.\u00a0<\/p>\n
So, may this holiday season occasion personal reflections of identity, vocation and lifestyle in the wondrous journey we call \u201clife\u201d.\u00a0 For unto us, indeed, a child is born! That would be YOU.\u00a0 (Jesus already led the way.)\u00a0Your move.
\n[I]
\nVergara is a regular contributor to the Saipan Tribune\u2019s Opinion Section.[\/I]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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