Let There Be Peace on Earth
In 1955, Jill Jackson-Miller, AKA as Harlene Wood, AKA Harley Wood, AKA Evelyn Merchant, AKA Jill Martin, AKA Jill Jackson, with the help of Sy Miller writes the song we hear echoed at Christmastime, “Let There Be Peace on Earth.” Out of a list of aliases emblematic of an existential crisis that finds Jill so severely depressed that she composes a lyric, “let there be peace on Earth and let it begin with me,” rings a popular Christmas tune. In my mind, knowing the origin of the song makes it all the more powerful and all the better.
Think of a popular image we have of Christmas—the creche, the manager. In its undomesticated form, it’s the picture of chaos. A picture of chaos at a social-political and moral level and at a familial level, too. The image is both an image of the failure of love and of love’s most dramatic triumph thus far. The Holy Family under a tattered roof with the babe Jesus wrapped in rags on a bed of hay is a picture of geo-political domination, of human displacement at life’s most vulnerable moment. The image is more than fearful and anxious. The moment is chaos, a depiction of humanity’s failure to extend care and nurture and love, choosing to wield power instead.
And yet, that’s not all it is. In the same image it’s love that comes to meet us in the mire and clay and confusion and chaos. The undomesticated manger teaches us that God, Emmanuel, God Come Among Us, meets us right where we are, even in the midst of darkness or existential crisis.
Perhaps you’ve thought, as you’ve followed the news, as you’ve paid attention to what’s happening around the globe or across the country, or even in your own life, that times might be too chaotic for Christmas, this year.
Nah. The story narrates otherwise. The babe doesn’t arrive amidst the predictable, serene, Rockwellian myth of suburban life. The babe arrives in the midst of the tornado where we live, preceded by cosmic-winged proclamation, a bunch of farm animals and a choir of sheep-herders. And if we're real, we wouldn’t have it any other way, because any other way wouldn’t be real. Merry Christmas. Fasten your seatbelt. Buckle your chin guard. And, hang on!
Love,
Jimmy
