Christmas Eve is drawing near, when in the churches such a familiar message will be proclaimed: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among people with whom He is well pleased.” I have no doubt that we would very much like this message of peace to be heard by as many women and men, elders and children, as possible.
Every year anew we sow the seed of peace, in the hope that it will sprout, thrive and flourish. But the reality is that the past year in the world has been full not of peace, but of unrest. Even more, in many places the unrest has reached the culmination of hatred – war. And it seems that lately the cannons sound louder than the word of God, and the voices of the cannons are heard by far more people than the voice of God. That is why war has entered the hearts and homes of many, very many, people, and as a result there is “shooting with words”, as if with bursts of machine-gun bullets, at neighbours, at the government, at refugees and at other targets that provoke dislike. The shooters themselves do not even notice that they too have become involved in warfare. The whistling of words sounds everywhere – when you go online, when you turn on the TV, and when you encounter it on social media sites. On one “shooting” site I once read the following comment, which lodged itself in my heart:
“Stop the world and let me get off!”
Perhaps many for whom this situation of verbal warfare is unacceptable would like to get off onto another planet, or to step into another reality. But God acts differently. He enters into the frenzied world, raging with hatred, and brings peace. This Christmas too he will remind us all of it and call us to follow. I have no doubt that we will do so as well, those of us who will hear God’s voice louder than the rumble of the cannons. But “getting off the world” we can sometimes also allow ourselves, not in order to disappear from it, but in order to return to it full of joy and to bring peace. That is why this Christmas I invite you to travel together with a certain character not from this world, but perhaps also from this world, through her different reality.
The Ladybird
She did not know that she was called the Ladybird. Perhaps because she was not of this world, but perhaps also because she spoke in a different language than those who gave the little creature this name.
The Ladybird was from the meadow. There everything happened differently. She spent the cool nights in dandelion down, but in the mornings, when the meadow was covered with tiny pearls of rain, the little one crept out from her night-time shelter. The whole meadow glittered with little stars, just like that meadow at night above the dandelion down. The Ladybird soon realised that there were two meadows. One, in which she had grown up, in which day after day she loved to climb the stalks of grass and bent-grass and pass the midday rest on one of the meadow flowers’ petals. The other – up there. The upper one differed from the first, because it bloomed at night.
When morning came, someone always gathered the tiny glittering little flowers into one big flower. The big flower opened slowly, usually in one and the same place, somewhere far away, where the two meadows met. At first it was bright pink and the little one gladly watched it. But the more the flower opened wide, the brighter it became, and the little eyes were dazzled so much that darkness set in within them and tiny stars began to dance before her eyes. The Ladybird was convinced that the stars were those same tiny flowers that disappeared into the big flower in the mornings.
However much the Ladybird loved her meadow, where everything was so familiar and customary, her thoughts flew upward. Her little soul longed to roam one day across the expanses of the upper blue meadow. To stroll among the glittering meadow flowers, to recline on one of the petal seats and wait, yes, wait for the big flower. Her heart trembled a little when she thought about how the gathering of the little flowers happens. The Ladybird pondered. Perhaps it is painful to disappear into the big flower. But perhaps it is happiness. Perhaps the big flower, by gathering the little ones, protects them from something during the day, and there they are in shelter, just like she is in the dandelion down at night. At such times the Ladybird opened her little wings, fluttered them so strongly that they began to vibrate, and the little dreamer rose upward along with her thoughts. She flew towards the blue meadow, moving ever farther away from the green one. But, alas, her thoughts flew farther and higher than her wings were able to carry the Ladybird. The Ladybird looked at the lower meadow, then at the upper one, and grew bewildered. She was somewhere between the two meadows. No, no, the Ladybird did not want that. She did not want to be somewhere in the middle. She wanted to be either in one meadow or the other. But which of the two? The little heart began to beat ever faster, because the longings that crossed within it were equally strong, for the one meadow as for the other. These momentary reflections were interrupted by the carrying capacity of her little wings, and the Ladybird slowly began to descend, until she returned to the green meadow and settled on a blade of grass that, gently swayed by her touch, comforted the little flyer. The Ladybird took to her wings countless times every day, and always returned.
Then one night, when the Ladybird was sweetly resting and the upper meadow glittered with flowers, it seems that the very one who, as day broke, usually gathered the little flowers into the big one, took pity on the little dreamer and brought the blue meadow down to the green one. It happened around Christmas.
A joyful feast of the birth of Christ!
Rudīte Losāne
Photo: oil painting by the Bulgarian artist Georgi Petrov