One of the unhappy ironies of the times is that Christmas has been subverted.

Christmas began as an occasion to remember that God became a human being in order to serve. Leaving his own home, he arranged to be born as we are, passing through the birth canal and being wrapped in scratchy dry cloths on exit. Around the world people celebrate that God gave up his privileges to be born a human being in Bethlehem 2000 years ago — to experience, as we do, colds, hunger and death so he could lift us.

Christmas marks a sacrifice in order to serve. When you think of it this way, it is strange that the Christmas season has become a grand shopping binge. We don't think of it in terms of how we can serve, but in terms of what we will get. Retailers do half their annual trade in the weeks before Christmas. The heart of Christmas has moved from the cathedral to the mall, from Bethlehem to the Eaton Centre.

It's not about the worship of God's actions, but consumerism. We don't lineup for (Christ)mass or for a Christmas service in a Protestant church. We lineup to the get the latest version of Universe of Blood Craft.

How did it get this way? It certainly has something to do with me. My own children have come to expect from their parents gifts, ones that are not too humble. I suspect they've been getting mixed messages from me. There are options though.

Many faith-based helping organizations today offer a great alternative approach. Perhaps the most accessible of these is the World Vision Gift Catalogue. For $55 you can buy two hens and a rooster (a self-replicating gift!) for a struggling college-age mother in Uganda. Kids and families in developing countries “love” getting baby pigs to help them out of poverty. And with the animals comes training in animal care and local marketing to help families become self-reliant.

World Vision, Christian Blind Mission International, and other organizations have printed and on-line catalogues that allow you to help stock a pharmacy or provide tools and seed for a produce garden. I don't mean to put my family on display, but one thing we've started to do is to give each other “gifts” of donkeys or school supplies that will actually be delivered to people in developing countries.

If there are some things you really need, I hope you get them for Christmas, or sooner. But if it's a choice between receiving more gadgets and clothing you don't need or helping others in tough situations, please consider making a different kind of choice. Anyway, my daughter wants me to look at a brochure, probably about giving bees, goats, or a small fish farm to an Asian family - or is that a Best Buy flyer in her hand?
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