THE GIFT WE WERE EXPECTING?

Whether we love or hate Christmas as a festival, we know all about it. But the same may not be true of the coming of Jesus. In Christ, God radically disrupts religious 'business as usual' and the politics of endless consumption. But our celebrations have been domesticated to disguise this reality, and the shock of the Gospel texts has been dimmed by our apparent familiarity with them. See my new Ekklesia column Christ is an unwanted gift for the religious - which started life as the Advent 4 sermon (Sunday 23 December 2007) at St Matthew's Bethnal Green in London's East End.