Christian, If You're Supporting ICE, You Shouldn't Be Celebrating Christmas

Christian, I’m trying to reconcile two things I’ve seen this season, maybe you can help me make sense of them…On one hand, I’ve seen your house, meticulously strewn with glowing lights announcing peace on earth, goodwill toward men.I’ve seen the outward displays of fervent religion in cards you’ve sent me and in heavily filtered Instagram posts that fill my newsfeed.I’ve seen your performative elation at supposedly being released to finally say “Merry Christmas” again.I’ve seen the spotlight-soaked Nativity scene adorning your front lawn every year.I’ve seen your annual passionate appeals to keep Christ in Christmas.But I’ve also seen something else.I’ve seen your social media feed.I’ve seen your anti-immigrant rants, the incendiary articles you share, the mocking memes rejoicing in the suffering of your neighbors that you continually amplify.I’ve seen your cruelty, your selfishness, your anger toward human beings not born here or those whom you suspect merely by their appearance or accent of not being born here.I’ve seen you declare your contempt for those looking to find rest in your midst.I’ve seen your support for a president who calls vulnerable human beings “vermin” and “poison.”I’ve seen you applauding ICE.And I know that soon, you will be in a church, surrounded by those you love, singing songs celebrating the birth of a child and the arrival of Christmas.With all due respect, you probably shouldn’t be.If you’re celebrating the mass deportations of distraught, exhausted human beings seeking refuge, you probably shouldn’t be singing sweet songs about a baby with “no crib for a bed.”If you hold in your heart such complete disregard for millions of strangers whom you seek to eradicate from your neighborhood, I’m not sure “let every heart, prepare him room,” should be on your lips.If you’re unaffected by the coming trauma to already assailed families who didn’t arrive nestled in the privilege you were born into, maybe basking in candlelight while singing about reverently gathering round a “holy infant so tender and mild,” is all a bit hypocritical.What I’m saying, Christian, is that if you aren’t capable of manufacturing the slightest bit of compassion for the hurting and the hungry and the terrified and the desperate right now, what on earth are you singing for? Just what exactly are you celebrating?What is the point of this holiday for you, if you can’t make room in your own heart and your little town and your own nation for the least of these when they actually show up looking for the love that you claim God is made of?If you can’t or won’t welcome refugees and migrants and screaming brown-skinned babies of families in duress, you really have no business celebrating the birth of Jesus.Those songs are about a foreign child.They are about a non-American human being.They are about a weary family seeking a place of simple exhale.They are about divinity clothed in dark pigmentation and unfamiliar apparel.They are about peace for the world coming in the most vulnerable form, and the welcome that was difficult to find.They are about the transformation of hearts that expanded to receive more than they had before.Maybe you need to give yourself a gift right now.You may want to pause before delivering another sugar-coated carol, another reverent hymn, another effusive song of praise to a single child born in poverty two thousand years ago. Stop and ask yourself if you can really own these words, given your posture toward so many children who are here right now needing a gentleness that you are defiantly reluctant to give.Perhaps if you think about the actual verses you’re singing and the object of those songs, you’ll hear the discord as you place them alongside your politics and your posturing and your social media rantings about “illegals.” If you read those scriptures with fresh eyes this season, they might condemn your affirmation of a president who is dehumanizing those the Bible called the alien among you, whom you are to receive as your own.If you can see yourself with objectivity, you might notice the dissonance in your celebrations, as you recognize that Jesus would go on to say that the way you welcome or ignore the poor and the hungry and the forgotten is the way that you will welcome or ignore him.And as you do this, I pray that a new compassion and mercy and generosity are birthed in you this season.I pray that empathy for those seeking refuge arrives unexpectedly in your spirit.I pray you find yourself surprised by something beautiful being born within you.I pray your heart is broken and altered by the need around you and that it moves you to alleviate that need instead of increasing it.And if your heart is already broken by this, but your voice is silent, then the most faith-affirming thing you can do this season is to stand and speak against what is antithetical to the heart of Christ.And maybe, just maybe, you will find yourself seeing the very eyes of Jesus in those you demonize and insult, those whose terror you applaud and whose sending away you celebrate—and you’ll become a place of welcome and rest and safety instead.Then, you’ll really have reason to sing this Christmas.The Beautiful Mess by John Pavlovitz is a reader-supported publication. 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