c. 2007 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Along about now, pulpits and church newsletters bristle with whining about the culture’s theft of Christmas.

There’s the so-called “commercialization of Christmas.” The manic retail spending but hesitant church pledging. Bustling malls but empty pews. Spotlights on Santa Claus but not on Jesus. The “taking Christ out of Christmas.” Need I go on?

We’ll even gripe about the people who finally do show up en masse on Christmas Eve and then scorn them for not being there every Sunday.

Never mind that these paradoxes are precisely the same as the cultural context into which Jesus was born. Never mind the teachable moment, the opportunity for compassion. Never mind that the religious holiday called Christmas has been a political and cultural icon from its inception.

This annual whining is a perfect expression of why many churches dwindle to irrelevance. This is “provider-driven” religion. We are blaming people for not wanting what we provide. It would be far better for us to ask ourselves: why don’t we provide what they want?

If people are hungry for food, why give them ritual? If people are hungry for meaning, why give them traditions inherited from former days? If people want to connect their lives with a living God, why condemn them for digging deep to buy gifts for their children or yearning for lost love?

If people want to sing Christmas carols because this is the best music we sing all year long, why would we force them to drone through Advent hymns just because the church calendar says it’s technically not “Christmas” yet? Is there some virtue in denying people their legitimate needs?

Forget the patronizing attitudes. Our members aren’t children who need to be taught the value of eating spinach. They are grownups who yearn for love, meaning, joy, and community. They are smart enough not to bring those needs to congregations where the preaching is dull, the air is filled with year-end anxiety about money or children aren’t invited to sit on laps and express their dreams.

The mall meets people where they are, whereas we blister people for not being what we want them to be. Who needs such abuse?

Meeting people where they are doesn’t mean being slavish to their self-destructive ways. But it does mean comprehending those self-destructive ways _ not as mindless appetite, but as yearning and hunger. Plodding through a dour Advent hymn is no response, especially when Macy’s is playing “Joy to the World.”

Of all the possible roles to play, we seem to have chosen the least savory. We play the uncaring innkeeper: no room for you here as you actually are. We play the Roman census-taker: do it our way, or else. We play the shepherds’ employer: stay out there in the cold, even though light is shining not far away.

I say, Stop the whining, and rev up the preaching. Let’s touch their hearts, not tickle their ears with clever Advent homilies about John the Baptist. Let’s love people, not berate them for spurning our treasured offerings.

If they ache to sing “Silent Night” in early December, let’s do it. Why not do the Christmas Pageant first, so that children actually connect Christ with Christmas?

It doesn’t matter that we are expert in dressing up stale bread in purple vestments and well-vetted liturgy. Stale is still stale.

(Tom Ehrich is a writer, church consultant and Episcopal priest based in New York. He is the author of “Just Wondering, Jesus,” and the founder of the Church Wellness Project, http://www.churchwellness.com. His Web site is http://www.morningwalkmedia.com.)

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KRE/LF END EHRICH