Hard to Celebrate Christmas in 2023- Reuben Kigame

I spent a quiet Christmas at home with family. It is wonderful getting to slow down, reflect and reset several things as the new year becons. However, unlike other years, it has been very hard for me to celebrate, at least for two main reasons:

First, it is hard for me to enjoy food because, with every single bite, I am reminded of so many families that have nothing to eat in Kenya and whom I am unable to help because of my limited resources. This country has made it hard for everyone, even for me, to make ends meet. It is a country that takes and takes, but hardly gives. I closed two small businesses this year, leading to job losses for those that worked for me. The government enjoys my music, but is unwilling to pay royalties. Yes, you see my songs celebrated right from the Head of State, to police and military bands playing them on public occasions, but years of waiting for payment makes it hard for me to reach out to so many who need help. Mine is not the only case. So many employers have had to lay off workers, because they cannot afford to pay them or sustain business. So, Christmas is here with so many hungry people in Kenya, a country blessed with very good agricultural land and lots of water! We have everything we need to expel hunger from this country and feed nations; but instead we have families who cannot afford a meal at Christmas 2023, nearly 60 years after independence! This is not just unacceptable. It makes celebrating Christmas this year very meaningless. I don’t know if you are like me, but I enjoy something best if those around me also have access. I cannot enjoy a meal with a hungry person next to me.

Secondly, it is hard for me to celebrate Christmas 2023 because Christmas has been cancelled in its birthplace. Many Jewish and Palestinian Christians as well as pilgrims that have been visitingBethlehem, the birthplace of the Messiah, see no reason to celebrate this year, because over 20,000 people have lost their lives in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that broke out in October. Many innocent children, men and women have been butchered because of conflict over “soil!” Many more have beendisplaced from their families and are living like refugees. Many hospitals have been destroyed from shelling and medical staff overwhelmed or are missing altogether. No water, no food, no electricity, no internet and other means of communication, in the 21st century? And all the while, countries like America and Iran just keep sending arms and other military support to fuel the crisis! How can I celebrate Christmas with this conflict choking my spirit?Hamas and their allies want Israel exterminatedand deleted from the face of the earth, hence the carelessly-repeated slogan, “From the desert to the sea, Palestine shall be free!” But in the same way, Israel mercilessly butchers children who have no idea that a political conflict exists and many men and women that simply cry for peace, all in the name of nationalism/Zionism or self-defense! The truth is that all war leads to loss and pain and must be avoided at every cost. A ceasefire is what we should all be pushing for. Every life, whether Jewish or Palestinian, Asian, American, Aborigene, African Russian or Ukrainian, is made in the image of God. I must declare here publicly that, when it comes to the Israel-Palestine conflict, the Russia-Ukraine conflict, and any other war, I am non-aligned. I am only on the side of protecting life. This does not mean that I frown at the issue of rights such as land, economic or political entitlement. I rank protecting life right at the top and hence, preventing war or having a ceasefire takes priority for me. That is the position I find of Jesus, the author of our faith and who loved, mingled with and served Jews and Samaritans, shepherds and Rabbis, men and women, countrymen and foreigners, PWDs, leppers, etc and cried out, “Let the little children come unto me.”

As we celebrate Christmas, it will help to recall that Herod set out to kill and destroy destiny by killing so many innocent children. That first Christmas is replicating itself in some sense through the horrible war in the Middle East, between Russian and Ukraine as well as in Ethiopia, Sudan, parts of DRC, etc.

In my Christmas reflection video posted yesterday on Facebook and Youtube, I looked at a passage from Isaiah chapter 9:1-6. I indicated that if anyone were to give me a special Christmas gift, I would ask them for the gift of “peace.” This is what Messiah came to bring. He is called in verse 6-7 “prince of Peace.” Yet, there are three things the Messiah came to end: Verse 1 says “There will be no more gloom…”, verse 2 says there will be no more darkness for “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light” and in verse 5, no more war andconflict as military equipment is destroyed and burned. That is Christmas for me. Peace is not just absence of war and conflict, but also mental rest and quiet, freedom from the darkness of sin that destroys heart, mind, body and soul. I wish someone would give me the gift of peace this Christmas! How I long for a ceasefire where guns, bombs and missiles are beaten into plowshares! How I long for a better Christmas next year!