EXCERPT:
Christmas can be a confusing time for all Christians, and particularly for Catholics. Already on December 26, my morning paper carried the phrase "now that Christmas is past us . . ."--this on the second day of Christmas! Our culture's hijacking of Christmas is so advanced that, no matter how many times people hear "The Twelve Days of Christmas," they still have no clue when those days actually are.
But the confusion over Christmas is much older than the current commercialization on which our economy depends for its survival. In America, Christmas has gone from an observance banned by New England Puritans in 1659 to a federal holiday in 1870, and since then has acquired all sorts of traditions from all kinds of sources. Some have Catholic origins, like the singing of carols, attributed to St. Francis of Assisi. But many traditions came to America from Protestant Germany via Victorian England, such as giving gifts on Christmas (rather than the feast of St. Nicholas on December 6) and the Christmas tree itself, which legend attributes to Martin Luther, father of the Protestant Reformation.
One might even argue that the American way of celebrating Christmas reflects how the divisions among Christians here have diminished over time. Yet the parishioners I work with often remain confused about the relationship between Protestantism and Catholicism. Are they separate religions, or different versions of the same religion? I typically answer by saying that "my Church is Catholic, but my religion is Christianity." Some people find that a pretty abstract answer, but now I have something more concrete: my recent photo of a Catholic/Protestant church!
Here is how it happened.
The Christmas display was already under construction in Strasbourg’s Main Square when I visited the city in early November. This city on the Rhine River has been juggled from France to Germany and back again, and so retains a unique character. France, a historically Catholic country where religion became a fighting matter and Protestants were once massacred as heretics, somehow embraces this town where Catholics and Protestants behave like extended family, in a way I have never seen before.
While the Reformation divided much of Europe into Protestant regions in the north and Catholic regions in the south, Strasbourg boasts a remarkable mix of Protestant and Catholic churches that is more typical in America than in Europe. In some cases Strasbourg’s co-existence of Protestant and Catholic Christianity takes on unique forms.
During my visit I attended a concert of ancient troubadour music at the church of Saint Peter the Elder. The amazing thing you realize as you approach the church is that it is really two churches stuck together. If you enter one door, you are in a Catholic church. If you enter by the other door, you are in the Protestant church. The concert was in the Protestant church, where we could see that its back wall, behind the altar, was actually the side wall of the Catholic Church, so the stained glass windows on the wall did not look outside -- they looked from one church into the other! It is as if, when the Reformation broke out in the sixteenth century, some of Saint Peter's parishioners wished to join the Reform, and so the parish built an addition where they could worship as Protestants!
The other remarkable thing is that this concert was part of an annual "St. Martin Festival," a series of performances scheduled around the feast of St. Martin of Tours on November 11, which is also Armistice Day (careful CrossCurrents readers know this is no coincidence). So while the performances are held at both Protestant and Catholic churches, the festival's timing is based on the Catholic Church’s liturgical calendar.
After the concert I picked up the parish bulletin -- only the phrase "Parish of Saint Peter the Elder (Protestant)” on top told me this was not a Catholic parish. I presume the Catholic church’s bulletin looks much the same, but is topped by "Parish of Saint Peter the Elder (Catholic).”
In settings like these, it is pretty clear that both parishes practice the same religion, each in their own way. Christianity is clearly their common faith.
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