By Rex Catubig

 

POPPING up amid the heartbreaking stories in the wake of Typhoon Odette, is the birth of a baby in an ambulance rocked by rampaging wind and rain.

Stories of the persistence of life under dire straits and the most inhospitable circumstances are stuff legends are made of.

In one instance some 2,000 years ago, it even made the biblical headlines, and was the foundation of what became as Christianity.

Oddly enough, the much awaited event had been romanticized as some silent night in the middle of nowhere, disregarding the incipient turmoil surrounding it. And the aftermath was not exactly a hallelujah moment worthy of Handel, either.

Joseph and Mary’s trip to Bethlehem was not an staycation but a compliance to a tax edict mandating villagers to return to their hometown to register for the tax census.

Facebook memes made a case against Joseph not booking a reservation resulting in their being turned away, thus starting the myth of the silent night that owes to Mary’s silent treatment of the spouse.

As memes go, the Three Magi were not exactly the wise men they were purported to be. In fact, their naive inquisitiveness, asking about the whereabouts of this much bruited about Messiah, made them the original Marites (Mare ano ang latest), Marina (Mare ano na?), and Mariposa (Mare post mo na).

And unknowingly, this uncanny, attention-grabbing, open search by the trio in their flamboyant royal finery, left a dusty trail of the dreaded news and had dire consequences.

King Herod, the authoritarian ruler of that part of the world, heard of the birth of this potential rival and pretender to the throne, being heretically touted early on as King of the Jews.

That turned him into a frenzied Praning state and immediately ordered the original Tokhang, the killing of thousands of innocent children, in order to eliminate the perceived threat to his rule.

That initial chaos subsequently led to the final gruesome chaos, where a robber was freed, and the poor child born in a manger, raised as a carpenter, but stowed away to become a preacher and fisher of men, was made to pay for mankind’s crimes.

It’s not a fair deal. But as humans, we learn and accept that life sucks.

So we just sing Christmas carols, and in some crazy inexplicable way, dream of White Christmas, unmindful of the devastation of Odette’s wrath, and the brewing storm of unconscionable politics that put us in harm’s way.

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