Do you remember your childhood enthusiasm for Christmas? I hope so.
        Yes, of course, there may well have been a healthy interest in presents and hoped-for toys, and lists for Santa Claus. How could children resist wrapped presents under the Christmas tree with their names on it? Who could blame you at the time? I certainly hope you don’t blame yourself for childhood materialism. You were a child, after all.
      Still, didn’t the magic of the Christmas tree itself, the lights and bulbs, catch your attention? Maybe there were homemade ornaments, perhaps even made by you, and brought out each year, even though, maybe, they weren’t the most beautiful items. They were still beloved because of the effort and memories.
         I hope that as a child you had a chance to bake and eat Christmas treats! Angel cookies! Nut squares! Fudge! Chocolate mints! Well, anything chocolate! Perhaps you managed to ruin a meal or two with your childhood indulgence?
           And, I bet all the figures in the nativity scene charmed you: animals and angels, shepherds and kings, a mom and a dad with a baby. Perhaps you arranged them, setting the sheep to chat with the donkey, the shepherds to converse with kneeling wise men? That’s what my younger siblings did.
          There was so much room for Christmas enthusiasm as a child, when we were innocent.
         If you’re like me, though, looking back over decades of Christmases, you might not want any more “stuff.” Presents may have lost their charm. And you may have to be the one putting up the tree, aware that only weeks from now you’ll be taking it down again, too.              And if your doctor is as fiercely determined to save you from yourself as mine is to keep me healthy, then a lot of the treats are temptations best kept at a distance.
         And then, there is the world around us, with fierce politics coming our way in a looming election year, and our own need to make choices, budget, keep informed and engaged. The press will provide us a relentless stream of struggle, pain and violence. It’s how they sell what they have. Do we know too much, doubt and grieve too much?
           Is innocence even available to us anymore?
           I hope so.
           God still breaks into the world to love us, and tell us that our lives have purpose and meaning. We need never be alone –
He’ll always be with us, teaching us the way to share our lives with one another, nourishing our human longing. There can be peace for those on whom God’s favor rests.

​When we think of Jamaica, the thoughts of Ocho Rios, beautiful beaches and wonderful scenery come to mind—all of which are part of the island. A year before becoming a priest of the Diocese of Mandeville, I spent 5 days with our founding bishop touring the diocese—and, I saw a very different side of Jamaica! 
 
Bishop Paul Boyle said to me: “We have dire poverty.  It’s something the tourists don’t see, nor do the television ads feature.  Our people are poor.  Jamaica is one of the poorest nations in the hemisphere after Haiti, and our diocese is the poorest part of Jamaica.” 
 
In the Diocese of Mandeville, there are about six hundred thousand people. Sixty eight percent have no running water; only, outside latrines. Families are using “primitive methods” of disposing human waste—they go into the bushes. People need  basic necessities of life:  food, clothing, shoes to wear, mattresses—many need a home. The average annual income in Jamaica is US$1,500.00—a little less than $29.00 per week. Many workers don’t receive even this wage.  Among people’ aged 15 to 19, 25% are “functionally illiterate.” Many of those who are functionally literate have severe reading problems.  Seventy-five percent of students who take standardized testing cannot pass even one subject. There is an alarming number of destitute elderly and abandoned/neglected/abused children and adolescents. People are dying every day from diseases, which no longer exist in the United States because we have adequate medical care. BOTTOM LINE:  the Diocese of Mandeville is very, very poor!

A two part series with Dr. Paul Ford.