Humanity and the Birth of jesus

Let’s skip the literal story of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Let’s get past the sentimentality of a baby born in a manger, shepherds, sheep and three wise guys from the east.

Let’s look at the events, not as history but as myth, a story told to convey a great truth. None of us need to believe either the story or the myth.

But let’s look at what the myth is attempting to say. What is the message?

The life force, the source of the universe, the ground of all being, God, whatever you want to call it, becomes a baby named Jesus who grows into a human adult. That is the essential story of Christmas. In Christian church terms we say God becomes a human being. No one has to believe that. It may not be true, it may not be history or maybe it never happened.

That is the meaning of the incarnation, that the power of the universe became en-fleshed in the world as a human being.

Lots of people do not believe this story. Unitarians, Jews, Muslims, atheists and agnostics do not believe that God became a man in the person of Jesus. Many devout Christians have trouble believing this myth, this story, and prefer to think of Jesus as an extraordinary human being, a prophet, and a mythic figure.

The basic meaning of the story is that human beings are so important that the creator God joined his/her creation, human kind. God became a human being. That gives tremendous importance to what it means to be human. Our humanity has such dignity and power that the creator joined the human race.

From that idea flows the need and desire to make every human being respected, free, whole and loved.

Many non-believers also work for these same human values.

There is no merit in believing in the incarnation. But if we do believe in it we then “strive for justice and peace among all people and respect the dignity of every human being.”

We work for peace, feeding the hungry, healing the sick, homes for the homeless.