Perhaps with all – or at least most – of all the bells and wrapping stripped away somewhat by COVID19 this year, this will be a truer Christmas, more in tune with God’s heart?

The emphasis and excitement has been abated and muted. I am more reflective – and less seeking of the material goods- than previous years. Perhaps the sparkle has gone a little, the sheen is gone.

But I hope this sharpens my understanding of the truth behind that familiar story: Mary and Joseph

A story of betrayal, heartbreak and healing.

Joseph, committed to his fiance, finds she has become pregnant – apparently by another man. His heart must have broken. His love dashed on the ground. Mary unable to explain, perhaps in any way adequately, why she is pregnant. The shame grows and he withdraws, prepares to leave her ‘at the altar’. Quietly. Cowardly?

More concerned for his apparent honour than for her. She has ‘dishonoured’ him (really?), but at least he doesn’t publicly ‘out’ her sinfulness and denounce her. Instead he plans to quietly ditch her. I am angry at his apparent cowardice and his seemingly mixed motives for stepping away, in his admitted confusion, from the person he believed would be his beloved for the rest of his life.

Deep questions rise to mind. Cultural norms and taboos have been smashed and is Joseph going back? Retreating into the mists of patriarchy, covering his own trail, not wanting to appear associated with a promiscuous, unfaithful woman so that he can keep his honour intact? While he leaves her beside the road in a ditch and retreats as she is exposed to the inevitable reproach and public shame?

This smarts of injustice to me. ‘Good’ Joseph turns out to be be a ‘choker’ when it came to the crunch.

Or was he?