ACAB Includes the Advent Police
Being a Jerk Has Never Recruited Anyone to Liturgical Propriety
For years the so-called War on Christmas has only served to obscure a far more insidious conflict, the War on Advent. Right wing grifters and outrage mongers have insisted that we ought to be forcing companies and cashiers to wish us a Merry Christmas,” rather than the more inclusive “Happy Holidays,” all while ignoring the season of Advent, which is—importantly—not Christmas.
Their opprobrium is is misguided on several fronts. First of all, it betrays the generous spirit of the gospel, which would welcome all comers and invite them to know God as God is revealed in Christ, opting instead for a coercion that has more in common with the Roman Empire that crucified Jesus than it does with the one whom they crucified. Second, “Happy Holidays is actually more accurate.” Obviously, many of our non-Christian neighbors are celebrating their own holidays around this time. But even if we limit ourselves solely to Christianity, there are multiple holidays during this time. Finally, though, the time between Halloween and December 25 (when the war is mostly being waged) isn’t even Christmas for most of the time.
The encroachment of Christmas upon the months leading up to it blunts the force of the Advent season, which, by and large looks towards Christ’s coming again in glory at the end of history more so than to his coming as the babe of Bethlehem. It also, ironically, means that by the time we actually get to the Christmas season (as defined by the liturgical calendar), we’re closing up shop well before Christmas is over. (At the Epiphany for Anglicans like me, at the Feast of the Lord’s Baptism for Catholics.) Thus, ironically, the War on Christmas leaves unaddressed the actual problem of not celebrating Christmas when it's Christmas.
All that to say, I really like Advent, and I like keeping it distinct from Christmas. Would that more Christians would do the same. I hope this establishes my Advent bona fides.
The War on Advent Sucks, But the Advent Police Might Be Worse
Knowing all this, I spent quite a few years as a member of the “Advent Police.” I made it my business to (somewhat snootily) insist that it wasn’t Christmas until it was Christmas. I did my level best to keep Christmas music out of my house until Christmas, and then to enjoy it during the Twelve Days. (As a parent, this was difficult. I eventually gave up the fight…though I was quick to point out to my kids how ready they were to move on from Christmas music once we actually hit the season…)
I saw this as a great opportunity for the church to be “countercultural,” in a sort of bastardized Hauerwasian position. Think of the witness we’ll provide if we keep ourselves soberly penitent while the wider culture is engaged in its shopping bacchanalia, only to hold a weeks long party when all of their Christmas decorations are boxed away!
But these dispositions were misguided on a number of levels. First of all, while it’s good for Christians to be formed by and follow the liturgical calendar, we’re still members of our surrounding cultures. And it’s unnecessarily abrasive to expect Christians to hold themselves entirely apart when those cultures are celebrating. (We ought to resist our cultures when they endorse sin, but when it’s something morally neutral, there’s no reason to insist upon aloofness and non-involvement.) Additionally, we forfeit the chance to influence anything when we decide not to participate. Second, one of the problems with being counter-cultural is that you’re still taking your cues from the culture you’re resisting. It’s like that ex that you’ve never quite gotten over.
But maybe most importantly, it’s okay for people to enjoy things, and being a killjoy, intent on yucking everyone’s yum is a bad look. Not only that, it evinces a spirit that’s also at odds with the Season, only in a way that’s more insidious because it comes with an overlay of smug superiority (or at least it did for me).
Thinking again about my experience as an Advent Cop with kids, I can’t think of a better way to alienate them from what I was trying to instill than to try to tell them that they shouldn’t be participating in the fun stuff that everyone else around them was. Resentment is not a great pathway for Christian formation.
So, I still like to keep Advent, and I still like to maintain it as something distinct from Christmas, but I hope that I’m doing it with a more generous spirit these days. I’ll still hold off on wishing people a Merry Christmas before it’s Christmas (though I’m also a lot more willing to return the greeting when someone else offers it to me, particularly just before the academic winter break). I’ll still keep using the greeting throughout the Christmas Season. I’ll still insist on calling the topiary that lives in our living room an “Advent Bush” (and/or an “Ordinary Time Shrub”) until after Christmas Eve Mass. But hopefully, I’ll not be an obnoxious scold about it. Because I don’t think I’ve ever inspired anyone to be a faithful Christian by being a jerk.