Food, Noise, Fire!
Rebecca Sicree on the Bethlehem Baboon & Other Christmas Traditions
Late one Christmas Eve, as my husband and I surveyed the mountain of presents we needed to wrap, a creaking board told us that we were not alone. Glancing up, I saw three pairs of eyes peering downstairs. I expected groans, of course, when I stomped up the steps and shooed our girls off to bed, but the tears were a surprise. Our oldest daughter Teresa finally told us why they were so upset. They had not been spying on their parents or waiting for Santa, she confessed.
They had been watching for Lizard Man.
The girls had been worried, you see, because our new house did not have a fireplace with a chimney. Instead, it had a Franklin stove with a stovepipe so narrow that Santa could not possibly squeeze through it. (For the record, our last house had not had a fireplace either, and their Christmas presents had always arrived anyway, but logic is little comfort to those below the age of reason.) Their older brother Tom, however, had kindly reassured them that while Santa indeed could not fit through the stovepipe, Lizard Man, being much thinner, could, so he would be bringing their presents instead.
I did not expect Lizard Man to be part of our Christmas celebration.
Nor did I expect the Advent Air Bazooka. Or the Bethlehem Baboon, but they are all as firmly established in our family as cake on birthdays.
I didn’t plan it this way.
I planned beautiful, devout Advent traditions to prepare our family for Christmas. My husband tried to warn me. He reminded me that traditions were things-that-cost-a-lot-of-time-instead-of-a-lot-of-money. He reminded me to keep it simple. He reminded me that we were not the von Trapp family. But even he could not foresee the strange forms some of our family traditions would take.
The Great Candle Competition
G. K. Chesterton called tradition “the democracy of the dead” because it gave “votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors.” If he had been blessed with children, he would have learned that the democracy of the dead is often overthrown by the dictatorship of one’s descendents. Live children have a way of overruling dead ancestors. They even overrule their ancestors who are not dead. By the time our tenth child arrived, our Christmas traditions had devolved to resemble the more successful children’s party games, all of which, as my husband is fond of pointing out, involve food, noise, or fire. Preferably all three.
Rebecca Sicree writes from Boalsburg, Pennsylvania. She and her family attend Our Lady of Victory Catholic Church in nearby State College. She and her husband Andrew have ten children, six of whom are now adults.
A Journal of Mere Christianity—Delivered to Your Door
- Essays on theology, culture, and the Church
- Contributors from across the Christian traditions
Six print issues (one year) of Touchstone, plus full online access and PDF downloads for only $39.95.
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95.
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on Christmas from the online archives
35.6—Nov/Dec 2022
on the Divine Promise Fulfilled by the Child of Bethlehem by James M. Kushiner
22.8—November/December 2009
on the Real Men Behind the Christmas Carol by Michael Baum
more from the online archives
33.1—January/February 2020
on a Saint's Charism That Cures Toxic Perfectionism by Colleen Carroll Campbell
32.4—July/August 2019
Today's Culture Wars Are Both Ancient & Modern by Allan C. Carlson
31.4—July/August 2018
Life & Love Are Real Despite Theatrical Illusions by Anthony Esolen
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
