From the Rector…
Eddie Scrooge???
I suspect many of us are familiar with Ebenezer Scrooge, of Charles Dicken’s famous ‘A Christmas Carol’, but how many of you are familiar with Eddie Scrooge? Now some of you may well be, but for others who are not, Eddie Scrooge is a modern-day version of Ebenezer Scrooge, and was portrayed by Ross Kemp in the UK ITV production of ‘A Christmas Carol’ in the year 2000.
In this version the producers took a different approach to the story when producing this new adaptation of this famous book, one that has already been immortalised in film several times over. Through careful and skilful changes to the characters and storyline, they brought the character of Scrooge into modern 21st Century Britain, while remaining faithful in many ways to the original book. Eddie Scrooge is now a rather nasty thug as well as a loan shark, and the backgrounds to the characters in the book have all been opened up and explored.
When the film was released, for the ‘A Christmas Carol’ purists out there it was seen as sacrilege to play around with Charles Dickens timeless creation. Reviews on this adaptation were mixed, but for me this new way of looking at the story really worked. The question then is why did it have so much impact for me and so many others, and why has it become a ‘cult classic’ now in its own right?
The answer is because it did away with the viewers familiarity with the story and setting, and made the viewers watch with a fresh set of eyes.
The story of Scrooge is so well known that many people gloss over parts of the story, and despite some rather wonderful classic film versions of this tale, the Ross Kemp version forced you to sit up and think about the message of the story, and most importantly made you want to go back and look at the original text. This modern version was uncomfortable at times, the depictions of modern poverty and the circumstances behind it far from being “Christmassy”, and it exposed some of the rot in society in a way that was relevant to living today. In many senses, it returned the story to how Dicken’s intended it to be received when he wrote it; as a challenge to the world around him to wake up and see the injustices of poverty and deprivation going on under their Victorian noses. Dickens wanted to prompt them with the reality that they could not ignore the horrific situation of the poor, and that if they did, they were failing in their Christian duty. Ross Kemp’s portrayal restored the gritty challenge and harsh reality of poverty to a story that has always had those elements in, but which perhaps we have become de-sensitised to. Multiple adaptations of the book into Disney Cartoons, The Muppet Christmas Carol, and other ‘feel good’ versions, have reduced the story to simply a “Christmas classic’, full of sentiment and Christmassy goo that focus on the character’s wonderful conversion. Dickens point though was not just about a man being redeemed, but the greater challenge to Victorian society of one that was in need of redemption by heeding the cry to show compassion to its poor.
Now, you may ask, how is this relevant to the biblical Christmas account Rector? The answer to that question is this; have we become too familiar with the Christmas story so that like ‘A Christmas Carol’, it has lost the impact it did and should have on us? How would the story of Christ’s birth be told if it happened today? What focus would we want to bring out, and how would we do that? In fairness, some modern adaptations of the nativity have been made over recent years, with Mary and Joseph either portrayed as refugees, or homeless, etc, but in nearly all those productions the focus is on the safe arrival of the baby, and cosy smiles around the crib. Now I am by no means a ‘bah humbug. Christmas killjoy, and I enjoy a good nativity play as much as anyone. It is lovely on Christmas Eve to see those acting their part around the crib with carols playing in the background at the end of the story, and to see children struggling to contain their excitement with Christmas Day just around the corner. The problem however is that much of our Nativity narrative comes from the Gospel of Luke, and for him this was not the end of the story but only the beginning. If we are to truly look at the Nativity story with fresh eyes, we also need to see what the other Gospel writers said about this event.
John in his Gospel does not mention details of the birth at all and concentrates on the divine attributes of Jesus, ‘the Word made flesh’ being his focus. Matthew does not give much more information about the birth but concentrates on Joseph and genealogies to establish a family line, and Mark makes no reference to it at all. Luke writes an ‘orderly account’ and goes into lots of detail, but the question is why? Why mention it at all?
In the Graeco-Roman empire of the First Century AD biographies were far removed from the style we have today. Birth narratives and childhood stories were often absent, as people were not interested in a person’s childhood years unless it was relevant to their later life, as ancient biographies focused on what a person had done in their lives. For Luke to include the birth narrative means that he wanted to make a point by including it, that Christ’s birth pointed to a greater truth, he did not include it to present a cosy image of the Christ child in the crib that would in turn spawn thousands upon thousands of nativity plays in future generations. That being the case, just as the producers of Eddie Scrooge went back to the text to try and draw out the deeper meaning of Dicken’s book, we must go back to Luke and remove the ‘Christmas familiarity’ and instead try and see why this event was so important for Luke that he records it in such depth.
So why did Luke make this a focus? Why was it crucial to Luke that he include the events in such detail? As with Dickens, who used the tale of Scrooge as a means of bringing to the fore the appalling treatment of the poor and the horrendous conditions they lived in, a careful look at Luke 1 and 2 indicate that Luke is right from the beginning following a theme.
So, what is that theme Luke wants to draw out? The theme being followed is one that points to the fulfilment of a promise made by God, that He Himself would step into human history and save not just the people of Israel, but all the peoples of the world who would accept him.
As Luke begins his gospel, the Jewish people have been without a king from the line of David for hundreds of years and are waiting. They are waiting for the promised Messiah of God, originally thought to be God himself, though by this time many believed God would send some sort of divine or blessed representative on his behalf. Luke’s narrative records from the beginning a carefully laid out and systematic chain of events that fleshes out the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament, including the birth of the divinely appointed forerunner of the Messiah as predicted in the account of the birth of John the Baptist. The significance and power in the story of the birth of Christ for Luke is at the moment of Jesus conception. Just as the Holy Spirit hovered over the waters at the beginning of the creation of the world, and brought order to creation, that same Holy Spirit now conceives in Mary something entirely new and not seen before in the history of the world, God himself incarnate, God literally in flesh. God who will walk on the earth as one of us, and who will bring order to the chaos of a sinful and broken world and who will reconcile humanity to Himself.
The whole narrative is more than just the journey to Bethlehem, laying Christ in the manger, and Angels proclaiming the holy birth on the hillside. For Luke, his focus is on a divine promise, made so long ago, that is now fulfilled. The promised deliverer is here, the prophecy has come to pass. For a people who had been waiting for hundreds of years for this moment, Jesus birth is the platform on which all will follow. Luke includes it because he wanted people to understand before he even began recording Jesus actual ministry, that there was a huge back story to the birth of Jesus, and that the promises contained in that back story underpin everything that is to follow. It is the junction point if you like between the Old and New Testament. Everything so far has led to this moment, and everything to come will stem from this moment.
So perhaps this year, when you see a nativity play, or hear the account read out, let your focus be on the fact that before Jesus had even done anything, God had fulfilled in this defining moment in history promises made centuries before. It is easy to focus on what would come from this birth, and by doing so miss all that led to it. Luke reminds of this so we understand that for a people who lived in a dark world longing for deliverance, for forgiveness, for God to reconcile and restore them, that the birth of Christ meant all those promises, to do just that, were about to be fulfilled. The light really did shine out in the darkness, and the people who lived in it saw a great light. God had arrived to sort out the mess, just as he had always promised to do, and the fulfilment of those ancient prophecies was the first true gift of that first Christmas.
With every blessing for this Advent, Christmas, the New Year, and the season of Epiphany,
Fr Kevin