Theology of Choice

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There are some stories that move us whether we hear them
at five or 55. The 1965 release of the first Peanuts movie,
A Charlie Brown Christmas, was instantly loved by adults
and children alike.

Interestingly, it almost did not make it past the television
executives who hated it. The movie was criticized for every -
thing from being too contemporary in music, to being too
religious in tone. But audiences everywhere confidently
disagreed. Having aired every year since its debut in
1965, it is now the longest-running cartoon special in
history.

One of my favorite scenes, which I no doubt share with
many, finds Charlie Brown on a hunt for the perfect "great
big, shiny, aluminum tree--maybe even a pink one" as
instructed by Lucy for their Christmas pageant.

At the tree lot, Charlie Brown walks through row after row
of flashing, shiny spectacles of color, trying his best to choose
well and please his friends. But then he sees a small, natural
tree, nearly overshadowed by the flash and glitter of the rest.
It is pitiful and loosing needles, but it is the only real tree on
the lot. In a moment of confidence, Charlie Brown chooses
the unlikely sapling over all the others (and is thus the target
of laughter and mockery by all).

Even as children, we know intuitively that there is something
remarkable about being chosen--perhaps something even sacred--
long before we understand the implications of choice at all. That
someone saw anything worth choosing in this sickly little tree is
a turn in the plot that quiets us. Charlie Brown claims the tree
as his own, and there is a part of us that feels chosen too.


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