December 24 Midnight Las Posadas

Luke 2:1-20

We rush through Christmas. We rush through life, trying to get it over with. Since before Halloween, we have been anxiously trying to get everything done, so as to have time to celebrate, and we continue rushing right through to New Year's. We even rush through the story, for the Christ to be born, so that the Kings can come bearing presents, missing the point of the gift that has come for us all.

LAS POSADOS is a Mexican tradition of the Church. Remembrance that the world Christ was born into was overcrowded, busy, just as our world is an overcrowded place, with people having other priorities and their own commitments. Historically, this was during the time of Emperor Caesar Augustus, that is after the time of Julius Caesar, when Quirinius was the Governor of all Syria. The Government mandated not only a new set of taxes, but that to determine how much tax was owed, every person needed to leave their home, their business and property, to go to their ancestral hometown, to be counted in a Census. This was not only the story of Joseph and his pregnant bride Mary. The roads and countryside were mobbed with crowds of thousands and thousands of people, all on the move, all making their way, to Villages and Cities where their grandfather's grandfathers had been born. Cities and Villages their families had left, perhaps for better opportunities, possibly because family and town had been divided over some problem. They returned to the Towns and Cities of their ancestors, because they were required to do so. Where at one time, a family of 12 had lived in an apartment, now those 10 children had grown up, married and had children of their own, who had married and had children of their own, all returning, all seeking refuge.

The point of Las Posados is that this circumstance was not only Mary and Joseph's, but for thousands of people that night, and millions of people throughout human history.

The story of Mary and Joseph is a story repeated by refugees, immigrants and exiles in many different times and places throughout the world. The story of Mary and Joseph on Christmas Eve is the story of the pilgrim and the sojourner, hoping for a new land and a new home, and a new way of life. It is our story as well. Our ancestors, and we, have all been sojourners, at some point in life. We have all sought refuge and safety, security and sustenance.
Tonight, we do not rush to the arrival of the Magi 12 days later, we rejoin the journey of the refugee, the immigrant, the forced traveler, and in the spirit of this season, we welcome one another by the grace of God into LA POSADA: The Inn: God's House of refuge, sanctuary, hospitality: sharing the gifts of faith with all who desire to receive.

Could we join in the first verse of: O LITTLE TOWN OF BETHLEHEM

This night in Sudan, there are thousands of people walking, searching for a place of rest, for a home. The Referendum is two weeks away, on 9 January. Deng and his young bride Anon, each lived in Khartoum in Northern Sudan for ten years. In 1980, Deng had been the eldest of 12 brothers and sisters. It had been Deng's turn to keep watch over the cattle in the Cattle Camp, when soldiers came in the night. Finding the Village asleep, they lit the on fire the thatched roofs of the tukul huts and when families ran out, they were shot. Such a choice: to be burned alive or shot to death. Deng had seen the fires, had smelt the smoke. That night, he and the other boys at the Cattle camp began walking, seeking help, seeking family, refuge. 26,000 children walked hundreds of miles across Sudan to Ethiopia. You could follow the path of their migration by the bodies of those who did not survive. Swimming across the river to Ethiopia, they were safe for a time. But then war came to Ethiopia. Again Deng had a choice to make, swim back across the river filled with crocodiles, back across to the other side, to war in Sudan, or remain to be shot. Deng and the others walked hundreds of miles south in 120 degree heat, avoiding soldiers and other predators, to Kenya, to the Camp at Kakuma, where they lived in refuge again. Word finally came that over 3500 of the refugees would be going to America, but Deng was not one of those chosen, so Deng had left Kakuma to go home, when he was arrested, he was beaten and taken to be sold as a slave in Khartoum. Now, a decade later, he had been set free by his master, told to return to his village, return to the place where his family had been killed. He had met Anon, they had fallen in love and engaged to marry. There, in their ancestral Village, he would Register and cast his vote for freedom, that there would be two Sudans, two nations under God. In two weeks the Referendum will take place, there is great expectation for Peace, and there is great fear of the renewal of war.

Could we join in singing IN THE BLEAK MIDWINTER

John and Mary had come to America, searching for religious freedom.
England, Holland, France, each had known persecutions of those who practiced faith differently.
The journey on the sailing ship had lasted for months, without enough food, many becoming sick and dying before they ever reached land.
This new country was a hard place. The soil was different, and crops that were planted withered and died. The Iroquois and the Sioux taught them to bury a fish with the seed to act as fertilizer.
These strangers kept the Pilgrims alive through the first long winter.
In generations to follow, how many different peoples have been treated as foreigners, as strangers, as aliens, and when have we welcomed them as we were cared for?
There were among our ancestors Exiles sent as a Penile colony to America.
Those who came from Ireland during the Potato Famine.
Those from back woods farms, seeking work in cities at the Industrial Revolution.
There have been Refugees of war.
Those escaping Russia.
Armenians escaping the Turks of the Ottoman Empire.
Those fleeing The Netherlands, Germany, Poland.
Those who came to America, rather than Concentration Camps, leaving behind everyone, everything, changing name and identity.
Those who escaped Cuba under Castro,
Those who escaped Viet Nam after Saigon fell.
Those who came from St. Bernard Parish, New Orleans, who endured Hurricane Katrina, then floods as the levies gave way and were rescued off the submerged rooftop of what was their home.
Those from Zambia, who watched both their parents die of AIDS, and as orphans came together to create families.
What is it to be alien, in America?
Where is home, when you cannot go back home?

Could we join in the first verse of IT CAME UPON THE MIDNIGHT CLEAR

Some are searching, not for a geographic home, but desperate for a safe and healthy spiritual home. There are those who seek simply to be welcomed, for who we are, as we are. Is there such an Inn?
Jeffrey was always a little different.
During High School he struggled with depression, that led to escaping his feelings, first with liquor, then with drugs.
Jeffrey became hurt and angry at the world, and the world was disappointed and angry with him for failure.
Jeffrey left home, certain his parents hated him, if they cared at all.
Jeffrey attempted suicide, doubting that anyone cared.
Helen is Jeffrey's grandmother.
Helen always believed in God's love and in forgiveness.
But now her home stands empty and hollow.
Helen cannot welcome her grandson without alienating her daughter and daughter's husband.
Who makes the first move?
When do we stand up to one another, and when do we help?
Who creates a place for the other?
Who welcomes whom?

Could we join in singing AWAY IN A MANGER

Love Came Down At Christmas recited

HYMN 41 O COME ALL YE FAITHFUL