S.A. Xmas traditions - Part Two

Whoops! When I posted about distinctive Christmas traditions to be found in San Antonio, I forgot several! So, here are some more, for this day after Christmas. "Xmas", BTW, is simply an abbreviation for the name of the holiday. Some folk think it's part of the effort to take Christ out of Christmas. But the "X" is actually the Greek letter chi, and thus the first letter in the title "Christos" or Christ ("the Anointed One" in English, and ha-masshiah in Hebrew). In fact, if you have ever noticed in historic Christian art something that looks like a capital "X" and a capital "P" together, THAT is the "chi-rho" monogram, representing the first two letters in the Greek word.

Also, it may seem like the first item on my previous list was a Christmas tradition that's universal, that is, lights and lighted decorations. True, but I was calling attention to Christmas lights of a fashion one will not find elsewhere. What other city (at least in these United States) has a Riverwalk like San Antonio's, or a Tower of the Americas with red, white and green lights shining in a ring at its top? So, my first item herein will also be something found universally -- but I experience it with the flavor of the Alamo City!

Cantatas and caroling. Singing is a VERY important part of the Advent-Christmas scene for me. After all, I greatly enjoy singing -- that's why I'm in the church choir. We at Alamo Heights Christian Church (Disciples) have a choir cantata every year, before Christmas. Since the Fourth Sunday of Advent this year was also Christmas Eve, we sang the cantata on Sunday the 17th. Janis Erwin, our director, actually tailored a printed cantata, to conform with what we had in the way of voices and other talent. So, on one song we had handbells, and on another a flute for instrumental accompaniment. We had one solo, by Kathy Huth, singing "Mary, Did You Know", a profound song about the meaning of the birth of the Messiah, composed by Mark Lowry.

Later that day (the 17th) I went to nearby St. Andrew UMC to join in an old-fashioned caroling. It started just after four in the afternoon, so the sun was still up and it was warm -- not the slightest chance of snow! That, however, didn't take away the enjoyment, as several folk of all ages climbed up on a pickup-drawn flatbed trailer and sat on the rows of hay bales. The pickup pulled us slowly around the neighborhood, as we sang many of the traditional favorite Christmas carols. And we made sure to sing the one that fits SO WELL in San Antonio: "Feliz Navidad"! Afterward, there was a brief "old-fashioned" Christmas program in the church's fellowship hall, of music, singing and scripture readings, and then refreshments.

All-Christmas Music on the airwaves. Yeah, this is another one that's not exactly unique to San Antonio. But still, it IS Texas-flavored, if you know what I mean -- and if you don't, it's ANOTHER reason for a visit to the Lone Star State! FM 101.9, generally airing soft rock music, dedicates the entire month of December to "all-Christmas music" and I seldom listen other times of the year, but LOTS during December! And another popular station I listen to, KKYX-AM 680, will also occasionally air Christmas songs. Usually of country music stars, but sometimes of other pop artists.

This year I seem to be paying more attention to Christmas ballads, recitations or other songs that tell a story about Christmas. For example, the late Grandpa Jones of Grand Ole Opry radio and Hee-Haw television fame has a recitation about one Conrad (or Konrad), an old cobbler with no family left living, who gets a message from the Lord that He will visit his lonely cobbler shop and home on Christmas Day. Conrad does get visitors -- first some friends with whom he shares the good news of the impending visit, and then three individuals, a beggar who needs shoes, an elderly woman who needs to sit down and rest from collecting firewood, and a little girl who's lost. Conrad graciously helps each one, and then notices that the day has gone, without a visit from the Lord. But when he prays in complaint, the Lord responds that His shadow had crossed Conrad's threshold three times -- for He was the beggar, the widow and the child! Get out the kleenex! And get it out on another I heard at least twice on 101.9 -- about a little boy who wants to buy shoes for his mother on Christmas Eve. The shoes are just her size and style, but please hurry and sell him them, because his mom's been ill a long while and is about to die. And the boy wants his mother to look beautiful "when she meets Jesus tonite". Let's hear it for Christmas songs! And for radio stations that air them!

Los Pastores. Like la Gran Posada, this is a very old Christmas tradition of Spanish origin. It's an example of the "morality plays" that entertained and taught average folk during the Middle Ages. In Spanish it's called una pastorela, or a play about shepherds. With singing, dialogue and dramatic action it tells an imaginative accounting of the shepherds and their journey to Bethlehem to see the Christ Child, of whom the angel had told. On the way various demons seek to impede their pilgrimage. Finally, the Archangel Michael goes into battle with the chief devil himself, Luzbel (Lucifer), and defeats him, so that the shepherds can pay their homage to the Christ Child. Thru the dialogue and the action, various moral points are taught, such as perseverance.

The best-known presentation of Los Pastores is done between Christmas and Epiphany (6 Jaunuary) at Mission San José, where it's performed by the Guadalupe Players, under the sponsorship of the San Antonio Conservation Society. But the Guadalupe Players also perform la pastorela in churches and at private residences that have requested it in fulfillment of a vow. I've seen Los Pastores performed at the mission several times over my years in Texas, and a couple of years ago I was invited to a home on the Westside to watch it there. I once read an analysis of la pastorela, that stated in detail that there were differences in the play when it was performed at a private home, at a church and at the mission. The script is the same, but the setting gives a distinct "feel" at each locale.

The enactment at the mission is oriented to tourists or new and curious residents of the city, of course, and so the emphasis is less on religious devotion or on doing a spiritual act, and more on performance itself. It's supposed to give viewers a taste of something that took place at the old Spanish missions in their heyday (the 1700s), something that the Franciscan missionaries taught the indigenous converts (of the Coahuiltecan tribe) in order to emphasize Christian teachings and make the new faith more real to them. However, 1) the script that is used is less than a century old, and was dictated to Father Carmelo Tranchese by a man who had experienced it in Zacatecas or some other part of north-central Mexico. And 2) the masks and robes or capes worn by the shepherds and the demons MAY resemble ones worn back in the 1700s, but under those costume parts the actors wear jeans and other contemporary garb, as does the audience, who sit close by, under a large tent roof, well-lit by electric lights; a professor from UTSA narrates and comments, using a microphone with loudspeakers. In other words, the realism of what MAY have taken place in the mission's heyday is quickly lost!

Nevertheless, Los Pastores, wherever in San Antonio one may see it performed, is a Christmas tradition that you, dear reader, ought to experience at least once. Yes, Christmas in this city shares many elements with all the rest of the country (and other northern countries) -- but it also presents elements that are distinctive, either due to the unique nature of our city or to its origins as a Spanish-frontier city and its continued proximity to the border with our southern neighbor, Mexico. And, as I've pointed out, much of the distinctiveness of Christmas observations here promotes the REAL REASON for the season: that we celebrate and remember that God gave us the very best gift He had to give, His very own Son, Jesus! CHRISTmas is about Christ!