Holiday hang-ups

This is the time of the year when our holidays start to all jumble together. We barely recover from Halloween before we stumble over Veterans Day and then we’re sideswiped by Thanksgiving.

And, all the while, Christmas and the New Year are waiting in the wings (never mind that Christmas music and displays have long since served as a backdrop to the aforementioned celebrations).

In the jumble we stand to lose the individual flavor of each. We shouldn’t.

Veterans Day, for instance, is in danger of becoming another ho-hum holiday. Sure mail delivery stops, and there are a few holiday-related closings, but in the main it’s just another day, albeit with a ceremony or two, overshadowed by its bigger and better-funded brethren.

On this Veterans Day, my wife and I had the opportunity to take in a concert by a chorus of senior men (since that’s my demographic, “senior” puts the right spin on it). It was good.

The program wove together music linking years, generations, hopes and dreams. Although I will admit I was worried. Sometimes, especially in times of national crisis or conflict, there can be an emotional retreat to God-bless-the-U.S.A-and-nobody-else patriotism. (It’s hard to remember that God is an equal-opportunity blesser.)

In this setting I was pleased to stand with other vets when the U.S. Army theme was sung, but also to sing songs that promoted peace as well as acknowledged our wartime history. “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” and “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” were balanced by the strains of the familiar hymn, “Let There be Peace on Earth,” and “If I Had a Hammer.”

We honored the veterans not just for making war, but also seeking peace. No Christmas music though; they’re saving that for another concert.

Connections to Veteran’s Day turn up a couple of times in this issue of The Catholic New World, too. And that’s a good thing.

Catholic Charities should be praised for taking the lead to honor vets, but not the ones who proudly march in parades or hang around the neighborhood American Legion post. (See Page 5.)

No, these are the vets who scrap and scrabble on the streets just to be able to keep on living. There is a plague of homelessness in our otherwise comfortable society, and it’s a plague which is visited worse on veterans than other groups. Catholic Charities is taking the initiative to minister, in the name of the church, to these men and women who should be honored rather than tossed away.

Perhaps it’s no coincidence, either, that scant days after we marked Veteran’s Day, one of our own, Father John Barkemeyer of St. Cajetan Parish, shipped off to serve in Iraq as an Army chaplain (see story, Page 15). In future issues we also expect to continue the “conversation” we began last issue with another archdiocesan priest, Father Brian Simpson, a Navy chaplain also serving in Iraq.

And if we’re going to take our holidays in turn, next up is Thanksgiving, which, if we’re not careful, we’re going to lose, too.

Whether merchants or football fans or turkey farmers (or turkeys, I suppose) like it or not, Thanksgiving is a day rooted in God.

If you and your family are lucky enough to gather together and share a meal on that day (the Sheridan clan expects a majority of its members to be represented), take a few minutes between the preparing and the devouring and the nap to be thankful to a patient God who loves us beyond our faults, doesn’t forget us even though we forget him, cares for those who don’t care back and gently nudges us to remember those who are not quite as comfortable as others.

Come to think of it, that attitude is probably worth more than just a few minutes on Turkey Day.

Tom Sheridan
Editor and General Manager

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