Category Archives: The Gift Bearers

Dec 13 2014
Santa Lucia, The Gift Bearers

The Night Walks with Heavy Steps

SantaLuciaCard

Have you ever spent a summer in Maine? I’ve spent many summers there, whether to be with family or, back when I was in graduate school, for a series of letterpress internships I did there in Portland and at the Shaker Community at Sabbathday Lake in New Gloucester. When it is summer in Maine, the days seem to last forever, with the sun rising early and setting late, well past the bedtime hour for many children.

Of course there must be balance to that, and now, as we approach midwinter, it’s quite a different story in Maine, and darkness falls early at this time of year and lingers long. The shift of darkness and light is even more extreme, though, in a place like Sweden, up near the Arctic Circle. The land of the midnight sun is, at this time of year, spending an awful lot of time cloaked in darkness.

Perhaps it is fitting, then, that the people of Sweden would open their arms and hearts to a saint from Sicily whose feast day comes in with the longest nights of the year. She is Santa Lucia, Saint Lucy, another of our wintertime gift bearers. The gifts she bears are simple but just what is needed about now: hot coffee and warm baked goods, heady with the scent of saffron and ginger. And light. Lucia brings light in the darkness. Of course we “see the light” and Lucia is a patron saint of those with maladies of the eyes, for she herself plucked out her own eyeballs in response to the unwelcome advances of a potential suitor. He loved her eyes, they captivated him. And so she put an end to that right then and there. This was under Roman rule in the fourth century and it wasn’t long after the eyeball incident that Lucia was martyred for her Christian faith. And while she plunged herself into darkness in her act of defiance, Lucia the saint became a light bearer.

And it is the Lucia who carries light with her in the early morning darkness, entering the rooms of the household with lussekatter (saffron buns) and coffee. She is usually the oldest girl in the house, and she is usually dressed in white with a red sash, donning a wreath of illuminated candles upon her head. There are processions throughout Sweden celebrating Santa Lucia, in churches, in schools, in city streets, on national television. The processions can get quite large, with scores of attendants to the Lucia, each bearing a candle, and also a large number of “star boys” donning huge white conical caps. Everyone is dressed in white, and the procession always centers around the Neapolitan melody “Santa Lucia,” but with Swedish lyrics, my favorite part being Natten går tunga fjät, which translates to “The night walks with heavy steps.” Such a beautiful image, and such a beautiful song. You can feel it warming the air, you can feel it bearing light in the darkness.

Image: An early 20th century Swedish Christmas penny postcard designed by Adèle Söderberg (1880-1915).

 

Dec 05 2014
Krampus, St. Nicholas, The Gift Bearers

Light & Darkness: Eve of St. Nicholas

Klausjagen-Küssnacht2011

I have long suspected that Americans just don’t have as much fun as folks in other countries. It’s that Puritan Work Ethic. We work and work and work and this is what the Puritans wanted us to do and we’re still doing it. The Puritans worked even on Christmas; they hated the idea of Christmas so much, they actually banned it. But that’s a story for another time. Or maybe not. We’ll let the Puritans be: both them and their austere ways.

Amongst more jovial people, there is a lot more celebration, and tonight is a wonderful example of that, wonderful as in wonder-full, full of wonder. It’s the Eve of St. Nicholas, a night belonging to mystery, for St. Nicholas is the first of the traditional wintertime gift bearers. He is the older cousin to the American Santa Claus. St. Nicholas the gift bearer comes from an historical person: St. Nicholas, Bishop of Myra in the fourth century, who became known far and wide for his acts of generosity… not the least of which was his hiding bags of coins in the shoes of poor girls who were without dowries. The legend grew from there and now St. Nicholas is sacred to countries throughout Europe.

Tonight’s gift bearer is not all happy and light, though; he has a dark side, as we all do. Actually, a dark companion. Perhaps this comes out of the humanity St. Nicholas is rooted in. His dark companion goes by many names depending on the country, but he is most commonly known as Black Peter or as Krampus, a sort of half human, half goat figure whose job it is to punish badly behaved children.

And while Santa Claus tries his best to operate under secrecy and dark of night, St. Nicholas and Krampus are often found parading through cities and villages on this night. One of the parades for St. Nicholas’ Eve include the Klausjagen parade, or “Nicholas chase,” pictured above. It’s part of an annual festival in Küssnacht, Switzerland, this eve of St. Nicholas’ Day. Many marchers in the parade will be wearing Iffelen––enormous, ornate hats that are made of paper and wood, meant to evoke the mitre hat of a bishop but also the stained glass windows of churches. They are lit from within by candles, and are upwards of seven feet tall.

Now that’s a sight to see. Surely there is good ale to be had, too, and perhaps some delicious cookies just for St. Nicholas’ Day. There’s plenty of time for work. A little celebration will probably do you good, no matter what those stern Puritanical ancestors thought. Anyway, St. Nicholas probably thinks so, and I bet even Krampus does, too. Krampus knows it’s all about balance.

 

Image: A photograph of the Klausjagen parade, December 5, 2011, by Matthias Zepper (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

 

Jan 06 2014
Christmas, Epiphany, La Befana, Solstice, The Gift Bearers

An Epiphany

Magi

TWELFTH DAY of CHRISTMAS:
Epiphany

It’s Epiphany, the day the Magi arrived in Bethlehem to see the child. Children in Italy have awoken to presents delivered over the course of the night by la befana, and in Spain and throughout Latin America, los tres reyes, the three kings, have done the same job. Today, la befana will be back to her housework, back to her sweeping, sweeping the holidays away until the winter solstice returns again next December. An old Italian saying sums it up: E l’epifania tutte le feste porta via.

Most of what we know of the Magi comes down through tradition and not through biblical writings. The story is that there were three wise men and that their names were Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, but in fact we don’t know their names for sure or how many there were. We do know, however, that there were three gifts. It’s an old, old story that we know well. The Magi followed the star, finally arrived at the place where Jesus lay, paid homage to him, and brought gifts to the child, gifts fit for royalty: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Epiphany is a Greek word, meaning “manifestation.” The local shepherds were the first to come see the child in the manger, but with the Magi, who came from far off kingdoms, the child was made manifest to the world. Epiphany has another meaning, as well, one that James Joyce spoke of, in which characters in stories, people in general, suddenly see things differently. The two kind of go hand in hand. Nothing would ever be the same after that first Christmas night, and nothing is ever the same after a personal epiphany, either.

And so with this night, our celebration of Christmas winds down. While Twelfth Night brings us raucous revelry, Epiphany is generally quieter. The day will proceed much like any other––here in the United States, for most of us it’s just another day at work. Even the Church in this country moves the date of Epiphany to a Sunday (it was yesterday by most church calendars), but traditionalists prefer to keep its date as it always was. In this house, we will celebrate with a quiet dinner. We’ll enjoy the music and the greenery and lights for one last night. And some time in the still quiet of this night, we’ll gather up the people in our home, step out onto the front porch, bundle up if it’s cold outside, and we’ll take turns writing with chalk above the front door the numbers and letters of a traditional inscription: 20+C+M+B+14. These are the initials of each of the Magi, punctuated by crosses and surrounded by the year. The chalk is supposed to be blessed chalk, but I doubt there are many priests left who remember this old tradition and who bother to bless chalk for their congregations, so I think any chalk would be fine, blessed or not. The writing is usually accompanied by a silent prayer that we’ll all be together to do this again next year. The inscription, a magic charm of protection and a reminder of the season, remains there for all to see and it weathers the year, sometimes washing away to a ghost of itself by the following year, and sometimes remaining as vibrant as ever.

After tonight, we might light the candles in our windows, but the Christmas lights outside will no longer be lit. All the greenery and the tree are to be removed. If you have the room, perhaps you can save your tree in a quiet corner of your garden. Just tuck it away there, off to the side, and next December, do what we do: use that tree to fuel your fire on the darkest night of the year that comes when the Winter Solstice returns next December. This is, I think, an honorable way to send off the tree that has brought your family so much joy this year, and continues the spiraling circle of time and seasons that gave that tree life in the first place. The tree, you, the Magi, the child, all are part of this same spiral.

Image: Three kings brought to us as gifts by our neighbors Don and Pat Cortese, Twelfth Night 2013. 

 

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