My parents’ divorce unfolded against the backdrop of the Christmas season, a time that had once been defined by warmth and continuity. The news itself broke earlier, unleashing a flood of tears in February of 2006, but it wasn’t until late November—when the divorce became legally final—that its full emotional weight descended. I was 16-years-old, standing at the threshold of Thanksgiving and staring down the approach of Christmas. Gratitude came hard that year. For the first time, I was expected to divide the holidays in two, as though joy itself could be neatly partitioned.
Along with the divorce went the rituals that had once given the season its filial shape. Our shared traditions disappeared almost overnight. There was no longer the familiar ritual of decorating the Christmas tree together with ornaments that had followed us since infancy. No opening just one stocking stuffer on Christmas Eve, per family tradition. No carefully orchestrated gift distribution governed by my father’s idiosyncratic numbering system using the board game Trouble. No post-present ritual of watching A Charlie Brown Christmas or A Christmas Story. No shared Christmas dinner as a single family. No sense of wholeness.
And with that, joy itself seemed to vanish from the season.
For decades since, Christmas has arrived each year carrying with it a familiar heaviness. What began as grief insidiously calcified into cynicism. That disposition has only been exacerbated by the increasingly aggressive commercialization of the holiday—a version of Christmas that strips Christ from the center and replaces Him with a moralizing Santa Claus, quietly catechizing children into a theology of works: Be good and you’ll be rewarded; fail, and you deserve nothing but a lump of coal as black as your sin.
I miss those old traditions deeply. Yes, the younger version of myself looked forward to the gifts, as most children do. But more than that, I longed for the rhythms, the repetition, and the sense that this season meant something enduring. Now that I know I’m autistic, the abrupt interruption of these rituals and routines helps explain why it was so devastating to me. Those rhythms were abruptly severed when I was sixteen, and for most of my life since, the result has been recurring depression during the holidays and a guarded, sometimes bitter posture toward nearly everything Christmas—save, by God’s mercy, the celebration of Christ’s birth itself.
Looking ahead, there is hope. Since my wife and I have gotten married, we’ve been slowly reclaiming what I’ve lost, not by resurrecting the past unchanged, but by weaving together traditions from both our families, each shaped by divorced, as well as creating new ones to hand down to our own children some day. That intergenerational continuity, once broken, may yet be restored in a new form.
This raises an important question: How do we love the cynic at Christmas? Perhaps you know one. Maybe they come from a fractured family. Maybe they carry grief, trauma, or a profound loneliness that the season only intensifies. Whatever the cause, the question remains the same: How do we love those for whom Christmas is painful rather than pleasant?
I don’t pretend to offer a universal solution, but I can speak honestly about what has helped me to feel loved. First, extend an invitation. Invite the cynic to a Christmas gathering or event, even if it doesn’t fall on Christmas Day itself. The effort alone communicates care. It quietly echoes the heart of Christmas: that God Himself did not remain distant but drew near.
Second, resist the gravitational pull of materialism. For many cynics, the relentless emphasis on consumption has drained the holiday of meaning. I’ve spent several Christmases without receiving any gifts, and that absence has never troubled me. Christmas isn’t about presents; it’s about presence, especially the presence of Christ. Each year, I devote time to prayer and Scripture, interceding for those who cannot celebrate freely—soldiers far from home (as I’ve experienced as a veteran), the poor, and the lonely. Inviting a cynic into the Word during Advent and Christmas can be deeply healing, precisely because it redirects attention to what the season truly proclaims: “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people” (Luke 2:10).
Third—though I say this with some humor—exercise restraint with the soundtrack of the season. I have no quarrel with genuine, Christ-centered hymns: O Little Town of Bethlehem, Silent Night, Away in a Manger, It Came Upon the Midnight Clear, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing. These songs proclaim theology, not sentimentality, and are true doxologies. What grates on the weary soul are the endlessly repeated novelty tunes that have nothing to do with the Incarnation, such as I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus, or the always dreaded All I Want for Christmas Is You. Turning off the Christmas radio can be a small but meaningful act of mercy. I say this as a former cynic.
Finally, share your joy, and don’t stop doing so. The cynic may appear irritated by it, but persist nonetheless. What matters, however, is the kind of joy you share. Not the vague cheer of “Christmas spirit,” which often functions as a poor substitute for the Holy Spirit, but the joy of the Lord Himself. It’s the joy we sing in Joy to the World: “The Lord is come; let Earth receive her King.” Invite the cynic to church. Welcome them into your home. Make room at your table for the widow or the widower spending their first Christmas alone after decades of marriage, or the co-worker or parishioner who has no family left to visit or is unable to visit their family for the holidays.
So how else might we love the cynic on Christmas—the one carrying the blues quietly beneath the tinsel and lights? That’s a question worth pondering. Perhaps, in answering it, we may discover that loving them will draw us closer to the heart of Christmas itself, and what St. John truly meant when he wrote, “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him” (1 John 4:9).
The Lutheran Column 