There are no Words.

The situation in Syria is no topic for Christmas eve. It's too easy to shelve, in their range and vastness, with the uncomfortable issues that might plague us any other day of the year. Christmas, for all it's supposed to be about sharing, giving and love, is also incredibly selfish. It's about what I want – the gifts, the traditions, the family time (lucky bonus if the rest of the family agrees to these principles) – and what I do not want is cold images of mass beheadings, reports of troops kicking down doors and murdering screaming families, or the ancient fear of a dark and powerful evil raising its ugly head again, sinking bloody teeth into the pages of history to ruin my feelings of warmth, and joy's security. Despite a pricking conscience, I must confess, I found the reminder to be unwelcome – which is selfish when you consider those for whom forgetting is not an option.

Yesterday I was discussing this topic with a friend. The familiar sense came over me as we talked, and I found I had less and less to say, as my mind opened wider and wider to the horror of the images I had seen and deliberately forgotten, and to the terror of what he was describing. I felt overwhelmed, overcome with the sense of helplessness. So far away from anything I know, it may as well be an invading black mist in a fairytale, for I've no idea how I would find it, or how I might combat so great and so advanced an evil. My courage, my valour, if I should prove to possess any, or at the very least my burning zeal – or perhaps it is desperation – is not a weapon I might wield against any foe. For this reason, it is easier to soothe the burn of its urgency, and to forget – society's greatest fault: diffused responsibility equates to universal exemption from the obligation to act. Even acknowledging that I find to be a most depressing reality.

I might have answered it in a number of ways. For one, it brought home to me how divine is the gift of prayer. What a blessed gift, to have the ability to reach out using a number guaranteed to answer. As someone to whom such devastation often is heard (before it is forgotten) as a call to arms and has been near to signing up several times, it is the greatest salve to my mind to know that something I do, can and will make a difference. Not to say that an almighty god relies on the pleas of lesser beings, but in the smallest way, my little voice and the groanings of my heart which words cannot express (Romans 8:26), are understood and are felt by one who knows all, hears all, and controls all. His might is sufficient for them. And that is a great comfort.

As we discussed what one might do in the face of this, for having been fearfully awed by the regimes of Hitler and Stalin together in high school, neither of us wanted to look back and say “We didn't know” or “We did nothing”. On the other hand, what might my puny contribution be worth to an NGO? What might my zeal in my limited sphere accomplish for those who needed it?

In younger days I would have expressed my fervour, and diverted the darkness of the topic by suggesting that I ought to be president. Depending on the mood, this would successfully redirect the conversation, or perhaps allow me a soap-box to air my social conscience and assuage the assault of my conscience, believing I had 'done my bit'. But the suggestion seemed hollow. I was assured through hard knocks a a few more years' experience that I was no ruler, and would never be able to steer a country clear of the calamity I wish all people to be rid of.

“We need a world president” was what came to mind. What might such a man do?

And at last, I remembered. Given the time of year, it took me long enough.

We need a world power, one with might and power to break the rod of the oppressors and rob them of their sinister strength; one which might bestow peace and comfort to those who had been victims, to those lost in desperation and darkness, to those living in the literal land of the shadow of death.

An infinite moment, reminding, humbling.

The people walking in darkness

have seen a great light,

on those living in the land of the shadow of death

a light has dawned...

Every warrior's boot used in battle

and every garment rolled in blood

will be destined for burning

will be fuel for the fire.

It was imagery lifted straight from the prophesy of Isaiah, which has been my Christmas reading.

And you've already guessed what follows:

For to us a child is born

to us a son is given,

and the government will be on his shoulders

And [even so] he will be called Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

There are no words.

Death for Christmas

So it's Christmas.

And in that sentence seems the entire motivation for writing this: happy twinkles in your heart, inundation of goodwill (especially from the local shops, whose saving offers – they seem to think – border on Richard Branson-sized generosity), and of course, the familiar story re-invigorating my imagination. I always like to look at it in a new way each year – the temptation to confine it in mental Christmas-card snapshots and childlike warm-and-fuzzies is exactly what shelves it among the likes of Santa, the Grinch, and that jar of fruit mince in your fridge for mincepies – they only ever come out on one occasion.

Just because that's what we do every year.

I'm not about to jump on the anti-consumerism bandwagon (though for Christmas, Easter chocolate and Valentines' roses I could rant for hours). But consider: why else but for silly sentiment do we drag boxes of dusty and tired décor from the garage and install it in the house for a set period of time? My little soapbox sermon today is not for anti-consumerism, but for anti-sentimentalism... and my thesis this year was on narrative empathy – go figure.

Again a disclaimer: I do not pretend to be a cynic on this issue. I, probably more than most, appreciate and generate the happy twinkles, and write about them and dream about them, and for ages can stare contentedly at the myriad of pretty shadows made by the lights on the Christmas tree. But I'm reminded of the phrase (probably paraphrased or misquoted, but anyway) that which brings a man to faith sustains him.

Why do you sing the carols? Why, once a year, if never at any other point, is the idea of a present God, Emmanuel, less offensive to you? Why, even if you see through the gift-exchange, because Christmas is actually about Christ, is the preparation of the traditional feast, the exact calculation and budgeting for perfect gifts, so extraordinarily important? If you come to God at this time because you like to keep it up, or you like the warm fuzzies, let me be another in a long line of people to try and pop that bubble. What is the distant mood of the Christmas spirit going to do for you during an existential crisis at midyear?

But I digress.

This year, I have been contemplating myrrh. (And if we're going to discuss wise men being brought to God by a star – that involves a separate post). I remember, in an otherwise forgettable representation of the story, a man presenting a gift to the boy Jesus, after the gold-for-a-king and expensive frankinsense were presented, saying “Myrrh is for dying and day of death.” It was perhaps a bit harsh for a children's film, but gives new context to “And Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.”

And perhaps, in keeping with my theory on injecting new emotions into tired narratives, I will venture a heretical statement: that Christmastime is not so much a time to contemplate warm blessings, but a tragedy. It's not difficult to be awed by the intricate operating bodies of newborns, the springing of new life in a tiny and complete human form, and yet here was one who had been branded at birth, like a Jewish child born in a concentration camp, marked for death. I don't know about you, but this year I find that desperately sad.

I have two friends whose dearest (and until now impossible dream) of having a child has just come true, and seeing this tiny person, so fragile and dependent, scares me terribly because I know (and can feel from their new-parent over-protective and by-the-book regime) how much the loss of her might affect them. Now consider Mary.

Now consider God.