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President Reagan and first lady Nancy Reagan during a Christmas
children's event in the East Room of the
White House in December 1981
(Photo: Dennis Brack/Newscom)
The Daily Signal
What We Can
Learn From Reagan About Celebrating Christmas
Lee Edwards
December 22, 2015
San Bernardino. Boston Marathon bombing. Charlie Hebdo terrorist
attack. Paris Bataclan Theater massacres. Jihad, Islamic State.
Caliphate. Syria, Iraq, Libya. Freddie Gray. Ferguson and Michael
Brown. Assisted suicide.
Whatever happened to peace on earth and good will to men? In times like
these when I am thinking of moving to Canada, I turn to my favorite
president—Ronald Reagan—who was blessed with the gift of serenity even
in the worst of times. He was eloquent about how much we have to be
grateful for and never more so than at Christmas time.
In his first Christmas message from the Oval Office in Dec. 1981, when
unemployment was high and economic growth was low and communism seemed
to be on the march around the world, Reagan talked about the national
Christmas tree he could see from the White House. He said the lighted
tree reflected the love that Jesus taught. (Yes, he actually used the
word “Jesus.”) Like the shepherds and wise men of the first Christmas,
“we Americans have always tried to follow a higher light, a star, if
you will…. At times our footsteps may have faltered, but trusting in
God’s help, we’ve never lost our way.”
In fact, we have shown the way to countless others. In his 1982
Christmas message, when the Cold War still burned hot in Central
America and Asia, Reagan recounted how Ordnance Man, First Class John
Mooney and his shipmates had picked up 65 Vietnamese refugees in the
South China Sea. Risking all to escape Communist “reeducation,” the
boat people had been at sea for five days and had run out of water when
they spotted the aircraft carrier USS Midway. As they approached the
ship, wrote Mooney, “they were all waving and trying as best they could
to say, “Hello, America sailor! Hello Freedom man!’”
“I hope,” Mooney wrote to his family, that “we always have room [in
America] for one more person …looking for a place where he doesn’t have
to worry about his family starving or a knock on the door in the night…
a place where they finally see their dreams come true and their kids
educated and become the next generation of doctors and lawyers and
builders and soldiers and sailors.”
An impossible dream? Not to Reagan, who after reading Mooney’s letter
reminded his listeners – and us – that “in spite of everything, we
Americans are still uniquely blessed, not only with the rich bounty of
our land but by a bounty of the spirit—a kind of year-round Christmas
spirit that still makes our country a beacon of hope in a troubled
world.”
In his 1983 Christmas message, shortly after terrorist attacks on a
Marine barracks in Lebanon had killed 241 American servicemen, Reagan
asked Americans to pray “for our soldiers who are guarding peace
tonight.” With patience and firmness, he said, “we can help bring peace
to that strife-torn region and make our own lives more secure.” Note he
said “help,” not suggesting that America should or could bring peace
all by herself.
In his 1985 Christmas message, shortly after his first meeting with the
new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in Geneva, Reagan spoke of Jesus
and the power of his love “that can lift our hearts and soothe our
sorrows and heal our wounds and drive away our fears.” He reminded us
that Jesus had promised “there will never be a long night that does not
end.” Ever the optimist, Reagan came to believe that we could “trust”
Gorbachev if we took steps to “verify” his promises.
In his 1986 Christmas message, when the Iran-Contra affair had just
broken and his presidency was under strong attack, Reagan kept his
faith in God. He did not question the motivations of his critics, but
turned his cheek. He said that God’s commandment to love our neighbor
as we love ourselves “is a commandment to respect the God-given rights
of our fellow men.” He quoted the prophet Isaiah:
“He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he
increaseth their strength … they that wait upon the Lord shall renew
their strength; they shall mount up with wings of eagles; they shall
run and not be weary.”
In his 1987 Christmas tree message, soon after he signed the
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, eliminating for the
first time an entire category of nuclear weapons, Reagan invited
visiting Gorbachev to observe the very top of the tree.
As a small reminder of the spirit of Christmas, Reagan announced that
the Star of Peace atop the tree would be lit day and night while “our
Soviet guests are here. … Let the star remind us why we’re gathered and
what we seek.”
In his final Christmas tree message in Dec. 1988, Reagan said that none
of us need feel lonely because “we are loved with the greatest love
there has ever been or ever will be.” He urged us to be grateful for
our freedom to worship as we please and to “redouble our efforts to
bring this greatest of all freedoms … to all the peoples of the earth.”
As we come home to family and friends this Christmas, the president
said, “let us all remember our neighbors who cannot go home
themselves.” Our compassion and concern, he said with conviction, will
mean much “to the hospitalized, the homeless, the convalescent, the
orphaned” and will lead us to the joy and peace of Bethlehem. Looking
around the nation and the world with all its problems and challenges,
Reagan offered his final Christmas words: “For it is only in finding
and living the eternal meaning of the Nativity that we can be truly
happy, truly at peace, truly home.”
A merry and blessed Christmas to everyone!
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