THE LONELIEST CHRISTMAS

                              

This will be remembered as the loneliest Christmas ever. Parents and grandparents lament that they could not gather with their daughter and her family (five persons), even though they live in the same town. Families are lamenting that the only place they could see their aged parents who live in the nursing home was through the window. It is very difficult to sing Silent Night while standing in the snow.  In some provinces health restrictions allowed single people to gather with one other family, once, during the holiday season.

 

Isolation is very painful. 

 

Being alone during the holidays (which have years of memories for families) brings sadness. It now makes sense that loneliness has very debilitating effects on our physical well-being. Families will tell stories of their aged mother who used to cook big meals for her large family, and always taking great pride in her culinary skills, now that she is alone does not even cook anymore. In the broad sense of the word, every human being needs to care for other human beings. This is how we are alive. It is together that we thrive.

 

Friends  of my grandparents typifies our need for each other. She was eighty-eight and her husband (a vigorous ninety-four year old was her caregiver in the nursing home). He was a gentle and caring man. When she died his daughters said: ‘It won’t be long.’ Eight weeks later he also died. He was no longer needed. Truly this was a man who died of a broken heart (his body was still functional).

 

We find meaning in each other. 

 

What do I hope we learn from this lonely season of isolation?

 

May we act on the conclusion that we must not go out and buy another ‘thing.’ Give yourself a gift and play cards with the grandchildren. Do not fuss over the floors of your house; go out and have coffee with your friends. Take your wife out to the high-end Asian restaurant and try a new menu. 

 

At the end of the day does it really matter that you did not get around to sweeping the garage floor?

 

This Christmas we experienced a distance from our faith community. Christmas always meant so much as we journeyed through Advent and celebrated Christmas. We missed the rituals and the deep meaning that they stirred up in our lives. We were missing our God.

 

Each person must evaluate what has happened through this lonely Christmas season. We could move forward and return to our very busy lives (we would have learnt nothing). Or we will integrate this pain and suffering into a more life-nourishing life. 

 

Life can become better if we can hold the hand of our aged mother in her dementia, listen to the stories of our grandchildren, have time to coffee with lonely co-workers and former curling buddies and just enjoy our daily time with God in prayer.

 

There is a new road forward out of this isolation.