CHRISTMASISM In pulpits, columns and airwaves it is heralded: Christmas is coming, let us prepare ourselves for the birth of Jesus;

let us cleanse ourselves of sin so we can welcome Him with a clean heart. To those who do not believe in Jesus oneness with His Almighty Father and The Holy Spirit, such words have no chronological sense as it seems true that Jesus was born only once. To those who believe in the triunic oneness, those same words are superfluous given the omnipresence of Divinity. Verily, it must be, Christmas is not a time or season there is nothing periodical about the permanency of The Lords birth ; for nothing can be tentative about our acceptance of Him. Christmas, then, is a joyful remembrance and celebration of a beginning that has no end. Jesus, timeless, non-cellular,nonmolecular, is not coming - He has always been with us. Still, it is also true that for multitudes who are too young, or too old, to have known, they need to be told of the beginning of the greatest story that has ever been told: The inauguration by Mary of the New Testament the Almighty : - her obedient surrender to

Behold the handmaid of The Lord: Be it done to me according to Thy Word. And the Word was made flesh, the Gospels say. It is too late to deny the historicity of Jesus, as it is too unfair to doubt the integrity of the Apostles, and their writings, whose passion for truth is affirmed by another truth: that they could not have been willing martyrs for a lie. For us men, to whom were not given the keys to divine mysteries, Christmas cannot just be about the miracle of The Christ. It must largely be about one who survived Jesus after nursing him; it must be about one of us, humans, who, too, would relish the innocent joys of the flesh : the thunder and sparkle of

man-made lights; the calming melodies of Mohrs and Grubers ; the energizing constancy of fickle colors; the scent of sugared pork, beef or fowl; the freshness of exotic sweets and grilled tastiness; the eager fingers waiting for vestiges of a Santa; the excitement of an unraveled box; and, among much more, the written though, at times, unspoken-yet-felt: Of all emotions that interest the human breast a mothers love is the sweetest and the best. Christmas is about our own Marys and, therefore, about us. Indeed, then, Merry Christmas is a merry heart; and only a clean heart may truly be merry. And, if it is Marian it must, after all, be Christian. Respectfully submitted, all for Almighty God Always:

Roberto Siccuan De Alban 9/10/11/12 December 2011. Tumauini, Isabela