The Nativity According to St. James

I commented yesterday on social media that I had not experienced much by way of inspiration this Advent, but that's probably down to sheer busy-ness. But no sooner than I had re-posted "Knock, Knock" from last year, looking slightly light-heartedly at the Annunciation, my mind went back to the first Sunday in advent and our visit to St. James' Piccadilly, when we saw this wonderful nativity set carved from pieces of an old tree that previously grew in the churchyard, and was damaged in the London blitz. Sally and I both noted the squirminess of the infant Jesus and the echoes of a Pieta in the carving. So given that the parish is named after "St. James the Less," sometimes identified with James the "Brother" of Jesus I wondered about this Mary talking about her experiences to a member of the family.

He was always a squirmer, as if

the straw of his makeshift cradle

had gotten under his skin.
Rarely a picture-perfect moment

of beatific mother and baby.
His coming into this world

was too chaotic for that.
Lots of Joseph’s sprawling
family around, but no

place to call our own -

no space for a new-born.
And that was before
we were forced to flee -
before he could even walk.
And I was too young, too clumsy
in my attempts to care for him.
What a crying he made for food,
readying his young lungs for
addressing hungry thousands
on northern hillsides and shores,
or calling winds and waves to order.
He wasn’t as bad as cousin John,
who, according to his mother,
danced in her elderly womb,
and was never going to be
confined within the priestly
profession of his father.
Jesus learned Joseph’s trade
before he died all those years ago,
but it was no great surprise to me
that he did not permanently remain
at the workbench, or settle down
to domestic life with a wife.
He was never going to provide
me with the grandchildren
to put into practice the lessons
I have learned since he was born.
Nor was he going to devote
his life to making and repairing
things with wood and nails.

And when he laid aside his tools 

To follow the path he believed 

his heavenly Abba had laid down 

for him before his birth,

we tried to bring him home,

fearful of what he was fashioning 

with his careless words,

but he casually cast us off,

us as family, me as mother,

in favour of his new family

of all too fickle followers,

just as he had cast off

my helping hand when,

in exile, he took his first 

faltering steps, before falling,

grazing his hands and knees.

Yet there is still a part of me
that longs to hold him
in my arms once more.
That day will come.
I know it will.

Selah