Ninth Day of Christmas

Depending on which school of thought you're from, the 9th Day of Christmas began this morning or starts at sundown. Unless your loved one came home today with nine ladies dancing, you probably don't even remember that Christmas is still going on. We tend to move on as soon as the calendar turns to December 26. Trees are taken down, nativity scenes are put away--I even saw St. Valentine's Day junk in a store on Dec. 27. But Christmas last for twelve days, ending at Epiphany on January 6.

It's hard to know what to do--especially in a culture that shoves Christmas into Advent and skips into it right from Thanksgiving. I wrote an email to our local Christian radio station for taking Christmas music off the air as soon as the first day of Christmas was over. I wait all year for it and want to hear it when I can (though I admit that I've been lacking in turning on the CD player--maybe I'll go do that right now--I'll be right back. A little OC Supertones swinging "Joy to the World" off the Happy Christmas album. I also like Plankeye's version of "Away in a Manger." It'll be followed up with selections from the Jazz to the World album).

There are a slough of festivals during those 12 days of Christmas--including the Feast of Stephen, on which Good King Wenceslas went out and the somber Feast of the Innocents which remembers the children that King Herod killed in Bethlehem in trying to do off the new born King of the Jews. Now I know us Protestants don't even know about Feast Days, let alone observe them. But just knowing they exist may help us relish in the 12 days of Christmas a little better.

So don't rush on. There are a few days of Christmas left. Linger in them with me. Jesus is born--and He will return again. God has walked among us. He knows what we go through in this life we live. And He loves us more than we can imagine (and nothing we do can change that fact).

Side note: There was a legend running around a few years ago--maybe it still is--that The Twelve Days of Christmas song was written as a chatechetical memorization tool for Catholic children in a time they were put under wraps in England. I think this has been pretty much debunked--the song was written simply as a memorization game apparently. But the supposed meaning behind each of the days is worth thinking about to make some sense out of what gets to be a quite tedious song:
1 Partridge in a pear tree = The One true God revealed in the person of Jesus Christ
2 Turtle Doves = The Old and New Testaments
3 French Hens = Faith, Hope and Charity
4 Calling Birds = the Four Gospels and/or the Four Evangelists
5 Golden Rings = The first Five Books of the Old Testament, the "Pentatuch", the Law of Moses
6 Geese A-laying = the six days of creation
7 Swans A-swimming = the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the seven sacraments of the Catholic faith
8 Maids A-milking = the eight beatitudes
9 Ladies Dancing = the nine Fruits of the Spirit
10 Lords A-leaping = the ten commandments
11 Pipers Piping = the eleven faithful apostles
12 Drummers Drumming = the twelve points of doctrine in the Apostle's Creed