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A bishop who gave to the poor St. Nicholas Day, Dec. 6
S
t. Andrew Lutheran Church, Parsippany, N.J., in 2012 returned Santa Claus to his roots by bringing St. Nicholas to life. Member George Uhlman, whose trimmed gray beard made him look like the Greek icon of St. Nicholas, came down the aisle dressed as Santa. With his red hat and fur cuffs, the children had no trouble identifying him. But they were told Santa didn’t always look the way he does today.
With good humor and appropriate background
music, Uhlman removed the Santa clothes and was “redressed” as St. Nicholas, the bishop, with an alb, stole, cope, crosier (pastoral staff), miter and three gold balls. Instead of a sermon, he took his place in his cathedra (a chair in front of the sanctuary) to answer questions from
www.stnicholascenter.org about his life and legends.
His most important message: “There is no St. Nicholas without our Lord Jesus, the greatest gift that God has given to the world. So let all the stories about Santa, Father Christ- mas or St. Nicolas begin and end in Bethlehem and the birth of a child in a humble stable.”
George Uhlman, who died in Septem- ber, played a perfect St. Nicholas at St. Andrew Lutheran, Parsippany,
N.J.,
in December 2012, said Kurt Gahan, who cast him for the role as part of his responsibilities for Christian edu- cation at the church. Gahan recom- mends
www.stnicholascenter.org, a nonprofi t organization in Michi- gan, for its wealth of ideas for cel- ebrating St. Nicholas at home, school or in the parish.
Our Advent wreaths are a powerful symbol. T ey are
our inner wheels removed. T is means we stop time as we know it and we take time to spend it in anticipation and preparation. If we were required to make our Advent wreaths
out of just one tire from our cars, life would be vastly altered throughout the culture. We would stop. Wheeling and dealing would come to a halt. We
would be “snowed in” in the darkness to prepare heart and hearth for the coming of the Son and source of light and life. We might take the time to make cakes and jams, to knit mittens, make quilts or carve dolls, work with wood, or bake and store up the traditional cookies and breads to be ready for the coming season. T e Creator God inspires the creativity in our giſt -
giving. T e giſt s we give remind us of “the giſt ”: the Christ child. T e “stuff ” of our giſt preparations is materia—mate-
rial that is holy because God took on a material being to live among us, also taking on our humanity through the body of a human woman, Mary. In the Incarna- tion, Spirit and matter marry to heal all our dualities. In wholeness, the marriage brings us the God/man. Without understanding that marriage, in which God
thought humankind good enough to join it, we rush only to one side: materia devoid of the Spirit. T at is materialism. T en it becomes that driving hunger where we
keep devouring stuff , things and material—and can’t be sated. We uncork the bottles looking for that spirit and come away empty. In a feeding frenzy that has us pawing through the sales tables and ear- marking the catalogs, we oſt en buy things for others with a sense of duty and despair. And because they didn’t fi nd Christ in their
Christmas giſt s, stores are mayhem again on Dec. 26, when presents are returned in disappointment because Christ came in the wrong size or color.
Tunes & traditions light the way But anticipating, preparing, creating, making—all can be a prayer that leads us through the darkness into the new light. T ere are dozens of hymns and Advent carols that speak to our longing, our fears, our cheer in
these waiting days: People, look east. T e time is near of the crowing of the year. Make your house fair as you are able, trim
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www.thelutheran.org
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