In Praise of Scrooge
Rev. Holly Baylies
UU Church of Wakefield MA
December 10, 2005

The Christmas season could not be even remotely complete without at least one stab at the likes of that squirrelly, Victorian miser Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge. Secretly, I think we all get a kick out of his blatant badness and kind of enjoy his heartless characterization, as there are times we all have felt just a bit like him. He is a man who once a year, at the most celebratory of times, indiscriminately spews forth every negative comment anyone could possibly express during the holiday season. He is the example of the ultimate hum bugger, the phrase he himself made famous. He is the soul, the root of despicable selfishness and greed at its lowest level. The likes of Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge is the character we love to hate. And we like to keep him around because he reminds us of how very good we can be, even at our worst. It's people like Mr. Scrooge that give the rest of us a good name! 

Charles Dickens Christmas Carol is one of the very few pieces of seasonal literature that never mentions Jesus or a manger or shepherds or angels or any other type of religious symbolism associated with our Christmas stories. 

In an article written by John Nichols, Minister of the Wellesley Hills Unitarian Universalist Society, he explains Charles Dickens's unusual focus for his Christmas story. He says: 

"In Dickens' England, Christmas was a time for parties. But he· saw another dimension. Although brought up Anglican with a sophisticated indifference toward religion., by the age of 30 he felt he either had to accept or reject Christianity. In his short life he had seen too much suffering, too much cruelty, too many people rejecting the opportunity to extend warmth and companionship to be indifferent to the message of Jesus~ He became. a Unitarian, because he saw in Unitarianism an attempt to tell and to live the real Christian message."

Written in 1842, Dickens introduced the character of Ebeneezer.

Scrooge whom he deftly described: 

"External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. The heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. They often 'came down' handsomely, and Scrooge never did. 

Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looksj 'My dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?' No beggars implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and 'such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blind men's dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they said, 'No eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!'" 

As the story unfolds, Dickens trails Ebenezer to the bowels of his office, his icy demeanor lingers in every corner of the dreary counting house of his business, in which he had made his disagreeable living for so many prosperous but resentful years. 

We all know the story about Bob Cratchit, Scrooge's loyal and enduring clerk and the plight of Bob's crippled son Tiny Tim. Even upon the first complete reading of Dickens' original story I snickered in the knowledge that Scrooge will eventually come face to face with his evil self and ultimately reform, overnight, into a loving caring generous man who in the end saved Tiny Tim from the disease which once threatened to take his life for the lack of expensive medical care. 

Scrooge is the man we love to hate. He personifies a living hell on earth from which we gather our true values by witnessing his repulsive examples of how not to behave! No story could be clearer or more succinctly told, by any prophet, at any time in history, with a more pertinent message than this one. 

In the story, a trio of ghostly apparitions visits Scrooge on Christmas Eve. The appearance of these phantoms is preceded by a visit from Marley's ghost, Scrooge's deceased business partner. Marley suspends his transparent form from the top of the fireplace mantle and explains his visit by saying: 

"It is required of every man, that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellowmen, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world - oh, woe is me! - and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!" 

The specter raised a cry; and shook its chain and wrung its shadowy hands. 

'You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. 'Tell me why!' 	. 

'I wear the chain I forged in life,' replied the ghost. 'I made it link by link; and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?'" 

Of all of our Victorian references to free will among our scholars and I theologians, this one is probably the most revealing. Marley wore the chains he forged in life. He created them, link by link and yard by yard  of his own free will. Now, at this exact time in history as the story was written, in both England and in the United States, The Unitarians and the Calvinists were engaged in a heated dispute regarding the concept of free will vs. the belief that 

our fate is predestined and even good works cannot change that fate. Marley's Ghost speaks well to the idea that free will is our personal responsibility and not solely an irreversible act of God. 

Marley's visitation ends and he dissolves into the woodwork, soon followed by first visitor, the Ghost of Christmas past. In his dream this second apparition took Scrooges hand and led him out of his bedroom window, deep into the past to see and to remember his youth as a lonely, forgotten child, rejected and ignored by his family and his peers. Scrooge saw himself, as a young man whose purpose for living, evolved exclusively from the rewards of hard work and accumulated wealth. Scrooge finally saw and painfully remembered and mourned the child he had been, that never was accepted by his family. 

Scrooge began to understand his growing revulsion toward any emotion, or affection he saw in others. He parts with the Ghost of Christmas Past tearfully, recalling his loneliness and rejection of an early life that he realized had betrayed him. 

Next came The Ghost of Christmas Present who showed him the private lives of those he knew, worked with and exploited for the sole benefit of his own wealth. What rattled Scrooge  was not primarily the plight of Bob Cratchit's family, but the fact that they remembered him and wished him well inspite of his cruel and impossible nature and his heartless demands. Scrooge wonderd why the needs of Bob Cratchit and his family never moved him to help them in at least some small way.

 Next, he floated into the home of his nephew and his wife and heard them joking about his accumulated wealth which he hoarded and kept unspent, doing no one any good. Yet his nephew kindly protected him and defended him , much to Scrooges surprise.

Finally, The Ghost of Christmas future takes Scrooge to the makings of a funeral, one in which the main event is the serving of food to entice at least a couple of mourners to attend. An unidentified old man had died alone. Scrooge watched in horror as the dead man's clothes are sold by the laundry woman before the undertaker arrived. Who is that man asks Scrooge? The specter points to an unkept plot and a weathered headstone engraved with his own name. 

Scrooge recoiled and said: 

'" Am I that man who lay upon the bed?' he cried, upon his knees.  The finger pointed from the grave to him, and back again. 'No Spirit! Oh no, no, no!” 

The finger still was there. 

'Spirit!' he cried, tight clutching at its robe, 'hear me. I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope?

For the first time the hand appeared to shake. 	 

'Good spirit,' he pursued, as down upon the ground he fell before it, 'your nature intercedes for me, and pities me. Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life!' 

The kind hand trembled. 

'I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. 1 will live in' the past, the present, and the future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me, 1 will not. shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this' stone!' 

Scrooge is then returned to his bed, and falls into a deep sleep. He awakens in joyous delight. He will get that second chance at changing his life and he begins immediately in frantic anticipation of all the ways in which he can make things right again. What a perfect example of the flexibility and resilience of the human will, to change and to reform after years of practiced and conditioned behavior. 

The total transformation of Ebenezer Scrooge is a dream I am sure we have all had or wished upon certain individuals whose influence has made our lives much more difficult than necessary. 

We have all had the experience of trying to change these Scrooges and lacking any access to specters, apparitions or guided tours of their lives we are at a distinct disadvantage. 

However Charles Dickens may have hit upon something that we have overlooked in dealing with the reality of our modern day Scrooges. Marley‘s ghost speaks of free will, the ability to enact change to consciously choose to see the world in a different light. 

We may not know what difficulties the Scrooges among us may have encountered in their early years, or how their childhoods affected their actions as adults. It is my guess that behind every Scrooge there was a sad, forgotten or betrayed child, one for whom there is no ghost of Christmas past or future to help him understand. 

More importantly for us all are the revelations of the now, of the visit to the present, to the home of Bob Cratchit, who blessed Mr. Scrooge, inspite of all he had done to him, undeservingly so. Even today, that gesture is probably one of the most difficult acts to perform ... to care for and to demonstrate an open kindness toward those who have made our lives exceedingly miserable.

 Whatever the conditions of our lives and or childhoods, the recognition alone of how hard it was to grow up unloved was enough for Scrooge to finally see and mourn what he had missed; to recognize why his life had become so unhappy and he so belligerent. Only then could he accept the possibility of free will and the ability to change what he discovered to be true about his own life.

I suspect that the Scrooges who live today may be unaware that they were not responsible for the adult messages which destroyed their spirit as children, destroyed their spirit as children. 

Not all of us came into this world loved and cherished as gifts to be handled with care. The result of that message we receive as children can set that course for the rest of our lives. 

Later in life, as Scrooge experienced, no one, even the most unfeeling or heartless, wished to die without someone who would miss them, without the grief of at least one human being, whose life had been made a bit better because he had lived. 

I am grateful to Charles Dickens for bringing us Ebeneezer Scrooge, for this beloved Christmas Story that powerfully separated the Unitarians and the Calvinists at a time in history when the concepts of free will and salvation by character were close to becoming obliterated from our religious teachings. We do wear the chains we forge in life, link by link, yard by yard and as links are added, Dickens taught us that they can also be removed. By knowing this we do live in the Past, The Present and The Future and have learned the value and weight of every lesson of every age. Let us honor the message of Christmas in our hearts and try to keep it all the year-

God bless you…everyone.

Amen