At the heart
of the Christmas story is an act of childbirth. Without it, there would be no
story. That is so obvious that it may seem as if it hardly needs saying, but it
seems to me that we often focus so much on the specialness of the child in
question that we miss the fact that his arrival in the world was absolutely
normal and ordinary, something every one of us has been through. There is no
other way into the world.
One born every minute?
Unicef
statistics say that there are, in fact, 255 babies born every minute – 367200 a
day - and the Gospel accounts say nothing to suggest that Jesus’ birth was any
different in essence from any of those. Legends
grew up fairly quickly about his birth, however, and by the Middle Ages, it was
widely believed that Mary gave birth to him miraculously, without pain or
effort. He somehow just popped out! This is pure wishful thinking, but it is
wishful thinking which robs the Gospel of its Good News. If this mother and
child were immune to the pain, risk and emotion of childbirth, then how can
Christ be one of us, fully human as well as fully God? What good news can there
be for today’s parents and children? What good news can there be for any of us,
because we are all somebody’s child?
Stories of childbirth
That’s why,
this Advent, I will be focussing on Biblical stories about the birth of
children. I will be asking how they help us to think about what it means to be
a child or a parent today. It won’t all be comfortable reading – there’s not
much that is cute or sentimental about these Biblical births – but it will take
us through some of the very best and most powerful stories the Bible has to
tell, and prepare us for the arrival in Bethlehem of the child who was born to
bring us “life in all its fullness.” (John 10.10)
There will be 24
reflections in the series, covering almost all the stories about childbirth
in the Bible. Each reflection starts with a Bible reference, which I suggest
you look up and read in your own Bible. There are also some questions and a
suggestion for prayer.
A note on the treatment of women in the
stories of the Bible
As you read these stories, you
may be shocked at how powerless the women in them are and how badly they are
sometimes treated. Does this mean that the Bible is a misogynistic, nasty
document, which should be consigned to the dustbin? It’s understandable that
many people think so.
It’s important to remember, though,
that the Bible was written in a world which generally regarded women as
inferior, and in which life was often precarious and brutal. It should be no
surprise that the Bible often reflects this. What’s remarkable is that women’s
voices and experiences are recorded at all. We often miss the fact that simply by
telling their stories the Bible challenges the inhuman way they are sometimes treated.
It shines a spotlight on their sufferings, but also on their hopes and dreams.
The Biblical writers see and acknowledge women, and in doing that proclaims
that God does too.
We are sometimes shocked by what
we are reading,. It is often the Biblical writers’ intention that we should be.
These stories bring women to the centre of the stage. The question they ask us
is “whose voices are you not hearing
today? Whose suffering do you overlook?”
