Christmas
Homily
William Dean Howells, who lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts, was a Harvard graduate and served in the United House of Representatives. Though, he is best remembered today as an accomplished author of short stories.
He was disillusioned by the commercialization of Christmas. Regarding how the spirit of the holiday had been lost, he wrote, “You cannot buy Christmas at the shops, and a sign of friendly sympathy costs little. . . . Should not the extravagance of Christmas cause every honest man and woman practically to protest by refusing to yield to the extravagance?” Condemning the secularization of this solemn day, he wrote a short story titled Christmas Every Day. The story is the bases for the movie Groundhog Day, Elmo Saves Christmas, and Donald Duck: Stuck on Christmas.
The story begins with the introduction that every Saturday morning, before breakfast, a little girl asks her father to tell her a story. Thus began…
In the telling of this tale a little girl, who enjoyed the gifts received on Christmas morning, petitioned the Christmas Fairy to allow Christmas to be celebrated every day of the year. The angel protests, and then relents. She will allow Christmas to be celebrated for a year, and then, at the end of the year, and only then, can the little girl decide if she desires that each and every day of each and every year will have Christmas every day.
As the story unfolds people received the same presents every day, day after day, until the gifts became meaningless. Every day was the same as Howells penned, “So it went on and on, and it was Christmas on St. Valentine’s Day and Washington’s Birthday, just the same as any day, and it didn’t skip even the First of April, though everything was counterfeit that day, and that was some little relief.” People had accumulated so many Christmas gifts that, according to the author, “Nearly everybody had built barns to hold their presents, but pretty soon the barns overflowed, and then they used to let them lie out in the rain, or anywhere. Sometimes the police used to come and tell them to shovel their presents off the sidewalk, or they would arrest them.”
Howells admitted that all Christmas stories are formulistic, following the stage set by Charles Dickens who wrote A Christmas Carol, and that he realized his story had a predictable though inspiring ending. A year has passed and it was the dawn of the original Christmas date and the Fairy visited the little girl. The child no longer wanted Christmas any day of any year. After some dialogue the Christmas Fairy convinced the youngster, well read it for yourself…
The little girl went to thank the old Fairy because she had stopped its being Christmas, and she said she hoped she would keep her promise and see that Christmas never, never came again. Then the Fairy frowned, and asked her if she was sure she knew what she meant; and the little girl asked her, Why not? and the old Fairy said that now she was behaving just as greedily as ever, and she’d better look out. This made the little girl think it all over carefully again, and she said she would be willing to have it Christmas about once in a thousand years; and then she said a hundred, and then she said ten, and at last she got down to one. Then the Fairy said that was the good old way that had pleased people ever since Christmas began, and she was agreed.
Howells wrote an essay expressing his dismay at the commercialization of Christmas. Parties and presents and banquets outpaced any spiritual recognition of the day. A greedy desire outpaced a spiritual desire. Commercialization of Christmas. Howells published his story in 1886. I wonder what the author would think of 2023?
Most telling for me in the story is what such opulence did for an individual’s attitude and behavior. What did it mean to have so much, too much, until everything, even life itself, lost its meaning. Well..
Well, the next day, it was just the same thing over again, but everybody getting crosser; and at the end of a week’s time so many people had lost their tempers that you could pick up lost tempers anywhere; they perfectly strewed the ground. Even when people tried to recover their tempers they usually got somebody else’s, and it made the most dreadful mix.
The commercialization – secularization – of Christmas is an old theme. In my seven decades of recognizing the holiday I know not of a year when this wasn’t an issue. In many cases I don’t feel that it holds true for most individual households who celebrate with parties and presents and banquets, though not to an excess. In my opinion what becomes overwhelming are advertisements that begin before Thanksgiving and continue to bombard us in the weeks that follow.
Gone is the simplicity of the shepherds who watched over their flock by night, and who listened the angels sing the carol “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.”
Inspired by an early 20th-century postcard craze, Joyce Clyde Hall and his older brothers, William and Rollie, who owned a bookstore located in Norfolk, Nebraska, began the Norfolk Post Card Company in 1907. In 1917 the brothers “invented” wrapping paper when they ran out of traditional colored tissue paper at the stationery store and substituted fancy French envelope lining paper. After selling the lining paper again the next year, the Hall Brothers started printing their own specifically designed wrapping paper. This followed with greeting cards. Then, they promoted their stock of party goods, trinkets, and stationery. In 1928, the company introduced the brand name Hallmark, playing on their last name and after the hallmark symbol used by goldsmiths in London in the 14th century. They began printing this logo on the back of every card and item. That same year, the company became the first in the greeting card industry to advertise their product nationally. In 1944, it adopted its current slogan, “When you care enough to send the very best.”
Why do I share this? Historians concede that Hallmark catapulted the commercialization of Christmas as we experience it today. With a touchy-feely Christmas you buy more greeting cards and trinkets. The Hall Brothers capitalized on the spirit of Christmas to enhance the profitability of the holiday. Sunday evenings Hallmark Christmas programs are a staple of the season, though as the shows tug at your heart the programs are addressing to your billfold.
And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”