Article December 24, 2007 Issue

Love's universal family

BY JOHN SCOTT

WHEN I THINK about the immeasurable and transforming impact that the light of the Christ has on humanity, I begin in the place where I live in Scotland—the town of Helensburgh (population about 15,000), which dates back to 1600. It's situated on the River Clyde, not far from the city of Glasgow and "the bonnie banks of Loch Lomond."

I think, too, of the times, no more than 60 years ago, when Christmas Day in Scotland was a working day. The postman delivered letters, and the coalman delivered coal for all those hearthwarming fires. So the trapping of Christmas were less apparent.

But did that mean that the coming of the Christ, the real spirit of Christmas, was less evident? I recently asked a neighbor who is a Church of Scotland minister how he felt. He explained that the Protestant Reformation in Scotland rejected any worship of symbols or intermediaries between man and his Maker. As a consequence, all feast days—those marking Christmas, Easter, and so on—were considered distractions from the main purpose of glorifying and worshiping God. An exception of sorts was New Year's Day, a time to welcome new ideas and reject some of one's shortcomings.