It’s Christmas and Christmas, with all of its mix of Christian and pagan symbols, with its shopping and gift-giving, has become the celebration of family. Christmas is our most important holiday because the family is still the core of our society.
Christmas is especially important now when so many families are looking on hard times.
The economic news is not good this Christmas. The economy is tumbling unchecked into what appears to be either a Great Depression II or a (new term) Great Recession. It is going to be that bad.
When the President-elect specifically says that the economy is going to get worse before it gets better and that it will take not months but years for recovery, the average family should be pulling closer together.
It is families that we have to be thinking about. Family is that place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in. That is because family is the place where we share the good times and go for support in the hard times.
Christmas is a celebration of the family as community; the celebration of who we are together. It is the only time when we still sing together. It is the time when we exchange gifts as tokens to reflect the fact that we care for one another.
If past economic downturns are any guide, caring for one another is about to get a whole lot more concrete than affectionate gift-giving.
In 1932 at the pit of the Depression, my parents, like many others, had to give up the comforts of independent, city living and go back to the family farm. In our case it was a farm just outside of Detroit owned by my Aunt Rhea and Uncle Harry. We lived there for a while in the tenant house, about the time I was born.
Formerly, families could hunker down and get past it that way by helping each other but many no longer have that option. Our industrial society has moved too far from our agricultural base. In most cases there is no farm to go back to and families are instead doubling up with already stretched siblings and retired parents.
America, and much of the world, has just finished a period of prosperous if skewed growth. Those good times were, unfortunately, living beyond our means and financed by debt. We borrowed for the necessities like school and housing, we borrowed on credit cards, on cars, and finally we borrowed on what was supposed to be a retirement nest egg, our homes.
The benefits of economic growth went almost completely to the wealthy. There are now over 460 American billionaires and income distribution is more skewed to the rich than at any time since the 1920s.
Even without the income, we indulged our hunger for things and a shop-till-you-drop life style. Many lost the spirit of Christmas, the spirit of peace and joy at the shared love of family. Chasing after wealth and things left us with nothing. The coming hard times should send us back to basics.
The past 25 years of unregulated and irresponsible market worship was a wild ride but it ended in catastrophic debt and near system collapse. Now we have to figure out a way to stay afloat as we pay for it.
The government’s $1 trillion “economic recovery plan” is meant to do that but it is more Christmas promise than present and is more business than family-oriented. The government is preparing this Christmas present for the economy because there is no way that families or markets can correct the problem.
The recent period of growth was also a period of strident partisanship. There seems to be a growing political consensus that the surrender to materialism and the drive for wealth was not a good thing for our country as a whole.
The country is beginning to show signs of coming together. Both Republican and Democratic economists agree on the size and nature of this Christmas program. Only Representative Boehner, leader of the House Republicans, seems to doubt and he is reduced to advertising for economists who share his skepticism.
Our new president-elect exudes a quiet strength and smiling acceptance of life. In fact, he seems to laugh and relax only in the presence of his family, his clearly strong-minded wife and beautiful children. His willingness to accept people as they are is a rare gift and one that promises much.
So, in the hard times that we see coming, let’s celebrate our way out of them by sharing this feast of the Holy Family, our family and the new first family. Let’s also celebrate that we as Americans are again promising hope to the whole world.
Friday, January 23, 2009
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