“And as Jesus was returning, the people welcomed Him, for they had all been waiting for Him.”  Luke 8:40

“Now Paul stayed two full years in his own rented lodging and welcomed all who came to him.”  Acts 28:30

“Welcome Christmas come this way, Fahoo fores dahoo dores, Welcome Christmas, Christmas day. Welcome, welcome fahoo ramus, Welcome, welcome dahoo damus, Christmas day is in our grasp, So long as we have hands to clasp.” “Welcome Christmas” by Albert Hague and Eugen Poddany, from “The Grinch Who Stole Christmas”

Celtic Advent is here!  It officially began this past Wednesday. Forty days to prepare for the welcoming of Christmas, and the Christ Child.  What an exciting time!!

In some traditions Advent is kind of a mini-Lenten season, with an emphasis on repentance, fasting and sweeping one’s spiritual house clean, so to speak.  While it might be possible for those practices to place a bit of a pall over the festive season, they can also serve a very good purpose;  To properly prepare to welcome an honored guest. 

Welcoming a guest was very important to the ancient Celts, and Celtic Christians.  There could be no higher expression of love than to hospitably open one’s home, and in the process one’s heart, to another person.  To invite one to sit by the hearth in front of a warm fire, to share one’s food and drink (think whiskey here), and to join together in songs and story-telling was to engage in a mini Ceilidh of sorts.  It was, and still is an integral part of the Celtic Culture and Faith.  They clearly grasped what our culture may well have forgotten:  that to welcome another person was to welcome Christ Himself and to entertain angels unaware.

The faith practice of welcoming is always important, but we are especially mindful of it during a time in which doors are being closed due to disease, family plans for the holidays are being put on hold, and meaningful interactions with friends are few and far between.

But welcoming as a faith practice goes beyond the act of holiday hospitality and opening one’s home; it starts with opening one’s heart to God.  That’s easier said than done.  Sometimes life’s heart-wrenching troubles and tragedies cause our hearts to shrink, becoming three sizes too small, just like the Grinch’s.  We socially distance ourselves from others, God and even ourselves, and in the process become lonely and loathsome.  The flame of God’s ferocious love which once burned so brightly is slowly extinguished, so that it is a faintly glowing ember at best. Our hearts become darkened, like the black pieces of coal placed miserly in Scrooges bleak fireplace, leaving no space or place for the warmth of the welcoming embrace of Love itself.  We need the breath of heaven to blow upon those cinders of cynicism and loveless loathing, so that the Spirit of God’s Christmas Love might fan into flames our own faith and love and result in our hearts growing three sizes!

You know what did it for the Grinch, don’t you?  Cindy Lou Who!  A little girl who worked her way into the Grinch’s lair and life, transforming his dark dwelling from a place of putrescence into the very fragrance of faith, hope and love; a love that overflowed to others, and caused him to open not only his heart, but his home to Who-ever might come! The concluding scene captures the significance of hospitality as we see the Who’s gathered together inside his cave on Mt. Crumpet  for a Christmas feast of roast beast.

That is the Spirit of Christmas, whispering the wondrous message of welcoming love into our hearts, and resulting in us inviting others into our hearts and homes, and in so doing welcoming God!