Christmas in Ukraine

 

                                   Twelve-Dish Christmas Eve Supper -- Jacques Hnizdovsky

This is no time for a child to be born,
With the earth betrayed by war & hate
And a comet slashing the sky to warn
That time runs out & the sun burns late.

That was no time for a child to be born,
In a land in the crushing grip of Rome;
Honor & truth were trampled to scorn—
Yet here did the Savior make His home.

When is the time for love to be born?
The inn is full on the planet earth,
And by a comet the sky is torn—
Yet Love still takes the risk of birth.

The Risk of Birth by Madeleine L'Engle

As you can see, I have circled back around to a poem I shared a few weeks ago by the late Madeleine L'Engle, marvellous children's author, essayist, poet and Christian. 

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve Day for Orthodox Christian communities around the world and I've been apprehensive this week that the Russian military would choose this occasion to rain missiles on the people of Ukraine. The Russians have consistently lied about not targetting civilian targets, as they were lying to the world a year ago at this time that they were not preparing to invade their neighbour. There is no truth-telling whatsoever in the Putin regime.

This Christmas is even more complicated for the Christians of Ukraine and Russia because of the hideous support of this unjust war by Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill, who is a Putin minion. Today Kirill called on Thursday for both sides of the war in Ukraine to observe a Christmas truce. While this sounds encouraging it is a step dismissed by leaders in Ukraine  as a cynical trap.Some congregations in Ukraine celebrated on the Western Christmas date of December 25th to avoid the threat and to disassociate from Russia. 

Even though many of us were disappointed to have our Christmas Eve services cancelled because of a Winter storm on December 24th, we live without threat to our security and safety. I hope that there is opportunity for Ukrainians to gather for worship and celebration of the birth of Christ tomorrow and Sunday across the country, despite the possibilities of attack. They are such a resilient people.