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I’ve been looking back over the last couple days of Gospel readings again and there are all kinds of emotions easily imagined within the events described—surprise, joy, anger, uncertainty, probably some sadness. But there is only one emotion that everyone is told to avoid: fear. “Do not be afraid,” Zechariah, Mary, and Joseph are all told. And then later this week, the shepherds: “Do not be afraid.” What’s so bad about being afraid?
Honestly, I’ve spent a fair amount of time there of late. Sometimes being hit by a sudden wave of fear about what my life looks like from here. And I feel justified in having that emotion. If you aren’t allowed to be afraid when you get a totally unanticipated diagnosis of terminal cancer, when are you allowed to be afraid? But when I bring that feeling to prayer…. and sometimes even when I don’t… I still get a similar message, “Do not be afraid.”
I’ve come to realize it is not a condemnation. It’s not that when we are afraid we’re being less human or less faithful or less anything. It’s just that God wants us to know that afraid is not a good place to “be.” When we hang out in fear we don’t think clearly. You’d think we’d make better decisions when life as we’ve known it is suddenly in danger, but we don’t. We actually are more likely to freeze or fight or flee, and whereas all of those have some rationality from an evolutionary perspective, within Christianity those actions have never been considered a path to the fullness of life. From the time of Jesus and his apostles, but no, take a step back… from the time of Zechariah, Mary, and Joseph, we know that the best choices we will ever make in our lifetimes will come when we could have gone the route of one of the 3F’s but didn’t.
A Zechariah in fear would have never spoken again, but instead he found a voice.
A Joseph in fear would have quietly divorced, but instead he chose to go forward with marriage and fathering a child not his own.
A Mary in fear would have never agreed to pregnancy before the safety of wedlock, but instead she gave birth to the savior.
A Jesus in fear would have fled the Garden of Olives, but instead he chose to walk to Calvary.
When a significant choice is to be made, the angels let us know time and again, it’s important for human history that the choice not be made from a state of fear. We make good choices only from a state of compassion and courage.
A few weeks ago, when I was working on my newsletter on John the Baptist, I ran it by a friend who interacts regularly with members of Congress, or at least interacts regularly with those who do. She corrected a line I had originally written about Congress members showing more fidelity to the president than to their voters. “This is off key,” she told me. “It is not that they actually agree with Trump or like him. It is that they are afraid of him. They can see what he is trying to do to those who’ve disagreed with him. They are making their choices out of a state of fear.” I re-wrote that part of the newsletter but have continued to think about the place where the Gospels call us to make our decisions from.
For me, the “Blessed Among Us” page in Give Us This Day each morning often gives me an example of someone to model my life after. Consistently it lays before me someone who did not live in fear. It’s part of the reason I asked you all to pray it with me each day, so that maybe we’d all have more models of courage in a scary time. This morning, I was introduced to Venerable Elia Dalla Costa—a cardinal of the Church and the archbishop of Florence from 1931-1961. He was known for his protection of Italian Jews and other refugees during WW2. “I am not scared by the powerful since the Lord is with me,” he wrote.
He seems like a particularly good model to have before us right now, but of course he’s not the only one, and “the powerful” are not all we have in our daily lives to fear. When I think of how to manage economically, I hold to the witness of my father who took tithing super seriously even when he had eight kids at home. He taught us we should not be less generous with those in poverty just because we have needs ourselves. When I think of living with terminal cancer, I hold to the witness of my mother who chose in her closing months trying to live the best life possible rather than pursuing every possible treatment to make for the longest life possible. She was an extremely courageous woman. I’ve been blessed in my life to have been raised by and then further surrounded by lots of courageous people who’ve known plenty to be afraid of but decided not to hang out there. Some of those people include you, and whenever you decide not to live in fear, it helps me not to stay there, too.
This Christmas, we may feel sad, happy, angry, uncertain, but may we heed the message of the angels and choose to enter this season of life with the courage of a Zechariah, Mary, Joseph, Jesus…. And a good deal less fear.
Photo credit: This is a painting done this past year by my dear friend Martie Rheaume who gifted me with it for Christmas. Thank you, Martie, for capturing the wonder with which we should greet every newborn entering this tenuous time!