"A Baby Changes Everything . . . "
. . . just don't make us put up with yours.
I know, I know, I know. They've rehearsed and rehearsed and prepared a perfectly moving piece of sentimentality, and nobody wants a babbling baby or a tantrum-y toddler or a petulant preschooler to interrupt the emotional manipulation of it all.
But when will we wake up to the delicious irony? What are we about, celebrating the inconvenient and unlooked-for birth of the infant Son of God by holding a party that's too grown up for the infant members of the Body of Christ to attend?
Comments (3)
Now there is a concept. What was Jesus like as an infant? A two year old. Temper tantrums? Time outs?
Well said! Deliciously ironic. And sad.
My mostly-but-by-no-means-entirely gay Episcopal church is confronting the fact that some of our youngest parishioners don't exactly bob up and down in the same rhythm as the rest of the congregation. They tend to sing where there's supposed to be silence, and wander around when everyone else is sitting still. To be fair, this is hard on some members of the congregation, for whom aesthetic pleasure is an important part of their experience of the G-d.
But it's not hard on me. Having lived in rural Central America, I sort of like what I call "Nicaraguan" childcare: a passel of children, more or less guided by the oldest among them, wanders in and out of the adult proceedings. Any spare adult will comfort any crying child - to the consternation of no one. Yes, things are messy, but in that genuine incarnational way that is at the heart of my own odd Christianity.
Irony can be a real bitch sometimes.