Christmas Gifts

With Christmas Here is the latest column by straight ally Kathy Badlock in Reno, NV:



A friend asked me a few weeks back, when we were talking about integrity I think it was, if I had ever opened any Christmas gifts on the sneak before Christmas morning. "No", I said, "Why would I want to spoil the surprise?" Now mind you this was during a conversation about integrity and .....I lied. I guess I didn't think it counted, as I was only five when I did it. It bothered me that I lied about something so simple and I've thought about the sneaked gift several times since the question. I was turning it over and over in my head as I hiked in the canyons nearmy home, trying to connect the gift, Christmas, who I was and who I am. Somehow they were all jumbling around in my mind in the same plane, so I let them comfortably settle in till it made some sense.



I went on line today to a favorite spot, Google Images, and typed in"Suzy Smart". Ah, memories. If you are of my vintage, you will rememberher. Twenty-four inches tall, blonde hair in a ponytail, tartan jumperand tam, white Peter Pan collared shirt, a desk and blackboard. She wasone of the first talking dolls. She proudly declared her superior intelligence. "C-A-T spells cat, D-O-G spells dog. 2 + 2 is 4." My Mom had her hidden in the hall closet till Santa came. (This was also the year I knew Santa did not come down the fire escape to my apartment.) In a one-bedroom apartment with three closets and four people, there was not much room to hide things, so there I sneaked a peek at Suzy the week before Christmas.



I grew up in New York City in the 50's and 60's, a city of 9 million people, pretty crowded, and I was lonely. Suzy was my pal. I played school with her. I talked to her. I hung out with her. When I could read, I transitioned from Suzy to Harold, you know the bald boy of "Harold and the Purple Crayon"? For personal reasons, I felt very safe in these fantasy worlds. It has taken me a long time to feel truly comfortable with me. You'd never believe that if you knew me. The kind of comfort I am talking of though now is the so-sure-I-am-valuable-and-accepted-comfortable. And how does this all tie into Christmas? I once thought as a child does, duh, and thought Christmas was all about the gifts, about Suzy hidden in the Christmas wrap in the closet. Then I graduated to adult. It became about the gift exchanges between friends and family. Now, however, I think I finally have gotten it. It is really about the relationships I have in my life.I can only do them so well and so openly and so freely because I am comfortable with me.



Christmas songs speak of the baby Jesus in a manger with lowing oxen and men with gifts. That was just the start. He grew to be a radical of His time. He broke so many of the traditional rules. The Jesus the gay community often hears of is inaccurate, the one who is not very kind to you. Check Him out for yourself. Go on line and go to any Bible translation website and read the Gospels of Matthew and Mark in the Message translation in particular. The real Jesus was all about justice and compassion and mercy. The strongest words He spoke were reserved for the uber-religious of His time. I have heard lesbians declare that Jesus "hated women". Wrong. The culture of that time most certainly devalued women, but read for yourself (in the account of the Samaritan woman) how Hero Jesus treated women, and children for that matter. Children were even lesser than women in that culture and Jesus told people they were better off dead that to hurt a child.



It is this Jesus who is not only my example of behavior; it is this Jesus who has given me a very solid picture of who I am. Lonely children hanging with their Suzy Smart and traveling the imaginary world with Harold don't usually end up with solid self-image. But I have. And I have because a baby was born in a manger. A baby who grew up tobe a man. It was all part of God's plan from the start.



Some people don't get the whole Christian-thing, the why-is-Jesus-so-important thing. Here is as simply as I can explain it: from the start, God knew we'd mess up, each of us, all of us, but He is still crazy about us. He took a part of Himself (very simplified theology here) and sent Him to earth to be born as a man, to be an example, to challenge old systems and ways of thinking and get killed for breaking all the rules. From the very start, in the garden, it has only been the spilling of some kind of blood that works for payment of doing wrong. The blood of God Himself is the purest and most powerful blood and it dealt with ALL wrong for ALL time. So, when I choose to align myself with the Mega-Radical, I get to view me from His point of view because all the bad I have done is erased. Very cool! I am no longer an outcast only good enough for Suzy and Harold; I am good enough for God Himself. That will boost your image!!!! And it brings lots of security. I don't need to look to you or to anyone to validate me. I get to just be me. And, I get to love you just the way you are. I don't need to change you, to straighten you out, to threaten you, to ignore you just because you are not like me.



I have said this before...I believe the gay community has been given a very wrong picture of the baby-turned-man-of Christmas AND the wrong picture of your community has gone the other way too. If we could just each see how truly valuable we are in God's eyes, maybe we could skip all the posturing and just be kind and accepting to one another.



I love Christmas time and not for the gifts. I love it because people take the time for about four weeks to stop and recognize the value ofrelationship. Maybe they are doing it with gifts, but think about thetime we actually give one another in December to just be together. That is the priceless gift, time with one another.



Check out the true message of this season for yourself. Stop gettingduped by the repeated rhetoric. For anonymity, go on line to http://www.gaychristian.net/ and ask all thequestions you want in very open and honest forums. The people in thatsocial networking community are very welcoming. There is also a churchin Reno where you are safe to be you and questioning. Ask all you want,turn it around in your head till you come to your own conclusion.Pastor Denise at Light of the Soul Christian Ministries (on Sunnyside at7 pm on Sundays) will tell you about this radical Jesus that loves women(oh, and men too!). Get His vision of you and you will get the gift ofthe season. Things may not be changing very quickly in this societywhere the marginalized are, well, marginalized. But, if you can alterthe view of you, all that ugliness coming at you will have less impact.



Suzy and Harold got me through the lonely years, I am very okay now andsecure enough to let you be you and love you the way you are. Have awonderful Christmas appreciating the finest things in life, the thingswrapped in skin and not holly paper. From me to you....Merry Christmas.