The skeptic in this piece was me - MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET Does Santa Claus really exist? Six year old Susan, the bosses at Macy’s department store, the press, and the American court system all want to know! Miracle on 34th Street is about whether or not a man calling himself Kris Kringle is actually Santa Claus, but it could also be about the difficulties of faith in a world that demands proof before anything can be deemed real. As the movie progresses it becomes clear that if Kris Kringle isn’t proven to be Santa Claus then an awful lot of people, not least Susan and the judge trying him, are going to be disappointed. Nobody wants to see him jailed but everyone, except Susan, feels bound by duty and the requirements of proof. Once upon a time a skeptic walked out into a wild-flower meadow and said, “God, if you’re real, give me a sign.” Nothing changed. Years later, as a man of faith, he realized that nothing needed to change because absolutely everything he’d seen that day - and every other day - had been a sign. In a way, faith might suffer from an over-abundance of proof! The judge finally accepts Kris Kringle’s claim when the U.S. Post Office acknowledges his reality. He and his bench are buried under all the letters addressed to Santa and delivered to Kris Kringle in the court-room. At that point he can’t see anything but proof. Susan gets her perfect Christmas, her mother finds love and, even the judge has a merrier Christmas because of old Kris Kringle. Of course, that’s Hollywood. In real life if “Miracle” teaches us anything it shouldn’t be that faith is difficult in a world that requires proof, it should be that doubt is amazing in a world where absolutely everything is proof. God is the Miracle on 34th Street, and every other street, field, mountain, valley, and corner of this wonderful world! Those Little Extras • Released in June 1947, the publicity for Miracle On 34th Street, made no mention of its Christmas theme. • The movie won Oscars for Best Supporting Actor, Best Original Story and Best Screenplay. • Receiving his Oscar for playing Kris Kringle, Edmund Gwenne said, “Now I know there is a Santa Claus!” • Natalie Wood played eight year old Susan. To The Gift-Giver The world still demands proof, oh Lord, but it does so with deceitful intent, aiming to twist words and prove them false. You offer none to them and I should not be trapped in trying to. Let me offer my life and my works, and the courage you will give me, as a proof the world can’t argue with, but might wonder at. And wondering, they might see the Truth. From The Gift-Giver But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. 2 Timothy 4:4. KJV How Wonderful Other People Thought It Was “Faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase.” Martin Luther King Jr. Minister and civil rights activist. 1929-1968 “Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe.” Voltaire. (François-Marie Arouet.) 1694-1778 “Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward for this faith is to see what you believe.” Augustine of Hippo. Roman Bishop. 396-430 “Faith and prayer are the vitamins of the soul; man cannot live in health without them.” Mahalia Jackson. Gospel singer. 1911-1972 “I gave in and admitted that faith was God.” C.S. Lewis. Academic and novelist. 1898-1963 https://youtube/watch?v=-ce_op2qG24
Posted on: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 23:54:30 +0000
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