c. 1999 Religion News Service

(Tom Ehrich is a writer and computer consultant, managing large-scale database implementations. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C.)

UNDATED _ To my amazement, a trip to the mall on the busiest shopping day of the Christmas season sounded appealing this year.

Even more amazing, my wife and I actually enjoyed our outing.

For one thing, we went late in the afternoon, when veteran shoppers were heading home. We had specific gifts in mind and weren’t forced to wander the cornucopia hoping for inspiration. We lucked into excellent sales help, including one Halle Berry look-alike at Circuit City, an electronics mega-store, who should be training all the sales help in how to guide lost shoppers through the mega-maze.

It also helped that we had no illusion of finding”the perfect gift.”We didn’t expect store-bought gifts to do magic.

The public side of Christmas just isn’t worth fussing about.

We’ve had lean gift-giving years that ended up being joyful and flush years that didn’t click. We’ve sat through charming Christmas pageants at unlikely places and watched mega-productions fall flat. My favorite”Nutcracker”took place at a high school in St. Louis, not the glossy stage of a pro-caliber dance company.

In an odd sort of way, over-decorated houses and tacky store displays have become bits of seasonal charm. A hurly-burly mall can feel festive. Or not. It’s over soon enough.

It’s the private side of Christmas that matters.

For this season is composed of a thousand small scenes that no one notices. Empty-nesters yearn for one more taste of a child-filled holiday. A widower puts up a tree by himself and cries to a partner who is gone. Mother and child decorate cookies and make memories. A holiday-worsened depression saps a family’s energy. One more night of alcoholic abuse feels like betrayal in the glow of other people’s apparent joy. A magical walk with one’s beloved turns no-place-special into a wonderland. A child wrestles with whether to believe in Santa Claus.

This private stage is where our hearts break or soar, our spirits rise or fall, our eyes moisten or grow cold. Even as we go through the public rituals _ in joy, in sorrow, in flat sense of duty _ the private scenes are where we meet God.

I don’t want to join the chorus of seasonal romanticizers. Caesar Augustus was a dictator. He registered people so that he could control and tax them. Like their forebears being led in bondage to Babylon and their descendants being herded onto cattle cars, Joseph and Mary were among the oppressed.

Imagine Mary as an Anne Frank who could not hide, a 14-year-old Jewish girl talking alone with an angel and then being forced to leave. Forget the maudlin art. This was a frightening moment. It took a brave Yes.

Imagine Mary with a round Slavic face, being led away from her hometown, toward an army of leering soldiers, clinging to her humiliated man, hoping not to anger or arouse her captors.

I think of that girl’s future husband saying his Yes to an event whose immediate outcome was shame among his people. Imagine Joseph looking for a safe patch of ground in a crowded refugee camp, as the defeated eye his belongings. Maybe there is a holy star overhead. But the oppressed don’t look up.

Imagine this frightened, dislocated couple as our forebears. Dislocation takes many forms: The moving van leaves, and we sit in yet another new kitchen and wonder if it will ever feel like home. The medical team departs, and we walk into a world that feels rearranged. The judge returns to his chambers, and we go our separate ways.

Whether we now unpack our china or the contents of our desk or a loved one’s lingering scent, we lie down on strange ground and wonder what morning will bring.

That is the private side of the season. We sit alone and wonder what kernel of grace can be found in life as it is. The missing partner, the empty nest, the ache to draw this marvelous flour-bedecked child close, bleak realizations born of illness, the wonderland of love _ could they possibly contain grace? How can this be, since we are so small, and life and the darkness are so large?

Ah, says the angel, nothing is impossible with God.

AMB END EHRICH