Shazam! (DC 2013, The New 52!)

By Geoff Johns and Gary Frank. Reprinted from Justice League #7-11, 0, 14-16, 18-21 (2012-2013)

Well, nobody's more surprised than me that I ended up buying this collection, and in hardcover to boot! From the very beginning of the New 52 version of The Hero Formerly Known As Captain Marvel, I found so many things to dislike about Geoff Johns' portrayal, mainly centering on the surly characterization he imparted to Billy Batson, which seemed very much a stereotypical obnoxious brat just like his similar and nearly simultaneous portrayal of young Bruce Wayne in Batman: Earth One. That wasn't the only aspect of the “updating” of the story that I didn't care for, to be sure. The new Dr. Sivana, bulked up and looking more like a cheap Lex Luthor knock-off, also rubbed me the wrong way. And the mess just seemed to get worse and worse as month after month of the back-up series appeared in the pages of Justice League, what with Billy and Freddy first attempting to capitalize on Billy's new powers to make money, then considering Billy's new adult appearance as a way for them to get alcohol. For someone like me, who loves the simple, almost childlike wonder and charm of the original Captain Marvel, which has, however imperfectly, informed most of DC's portrayals of the character hitherto (Dark Mary Marvel and subsequent developments being lamentable departures from that model, essentially exceptions that prove the rule), it seemed like these newest horrors were just going from bad to worse. It was heartbreaking.

And then...

The Date of Christmas Revisited

Two years ago I posted regarding what was then my new-found realization that the widely held notion that the specific day of the year upon which Our Lord was born is unknown and that the prevailing celebration of that birth on 25 December owes more to pre-Christian pagan custom is incorrect, that there is indeed solid Biblical evidence, based on the Archangel's appearance to Zachariah, that the Nativity did take place some time in what according to the current Gregorian Calendar would be late December.  As has, in my mind at least, according to good medieval thinking, become a custom ("twice makes a custom"), I re-present that post, followed by a few notes and further references.

* * *

Don't Mess With Santa Claus!

It's well known that Santa Claus, "Jolly Old Saint Nick," is based on an historical figure, St. Nicholas of Myra, who lived in the early 4th century, whose Feast Day is celebrated on 6 December.  According to the most famous legend associated with this good bishop, upon learning that one of the members of his church, a poor man, had three daughters for whom he could not provide dowries and who were thus in all probability fated for spinsterhood or worse, Nicholas secretly left gifts for the girls to provide for good marriages.  Out of that story, no doubt encouraged by the timing of his feast and the easy association with the Gifts of the Magi to the Christ Child, evolved the idea of Santa Claus as the giver of Christmas gifts.

For more about St. Nicholas and how he "became" Santa Claus, I can do no better than refer you to a wonderful web site devoted to the saint both historical and fanciful, St. Nicholas Center:  Discovering the Truth About Santa Claus [link].  Included there is another somewhat lesser-known tale regarding St. Nicholas, however, that I have seen referenced more and more in recent years and which has given birth to a host of memes compiled in a humorous post by "Dan" at Rockadoodee! [link] (which I have freely mined for some of the images here), how the historical St. Nicholas "dealt with" the heretic Arius of Alexandria during the Council of Nicaea in AD 325 [link].

Yes, Harry, there IS a Santa Claus....

Image source

From Cold Days (2012), the fourteenth volume in The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher – at the Winter Court of Mab, Queen of Air and Darkness, told in the first-person by Harry Dresden, one-time professional wizard of Chicago, now Winter Knight:

“I studied the man standing beside the Erlking.... He was a sharp contrast. The Erlking was huge, but there was something about him that suggested agility and grace. It was like looking at a tiger. …

“This man wasn't a tiger. He was a bear. His shoulders were so broadly proportioned that he made Herne [the Hunter, the Erlking] look positively slender by comparison. His forearms were nearly the size of his biceps, and he had the kind of thick neck that you see only in power lifters and professional thugs. There were scars all over his hands, and more on his face, all of them faded away to ancient white lines, like those you see on some lifelong bikers. He wore a coat of mail of some kind – a creature of Faerie couldn't abide the touch of iron, so it had to be made from something else.

“Over the mail he wore a long, open coat of scarlet, trimmed in white fur. It was held in with a wide black leather belt. He had such a barrel of a chest that even a modest bit of stomach was a considerable mass on his huge frame. His gloves were made of black leather trimmed with more white fur, and they were tucked through the belt, right next to the very plain and functional hilt of an unadorned broadsword. His hair was short, white, and shining clean, and his white beard fell over his chest like the white breaker of a wave. His eyes were clean, winter sky blue.

“I lost track of what Eldest Gruff was saying, because my mouth was falling open.

“The second man noticed my expression and let out a low, rumbling chuckle. It wasn't one of those ironic snickers. It was a rolling, full-throated sound of amusement, and it made his stomach shake like . . . dare I say it?

“Like a bowl full of jelly. …

“His hand engulfed mine as he continued to chortle. His fingers could have crushed my bones. 'I know who you are, Dresden,' he rumbled. 'Call me Kringle.' …

“'Dude,' I said. 'Dude. You're . . . freaking Santa Claus.'

“'Not until after Halloween,' he said.” (pp. 37, 38)

It's 25th December - Merry Christmas!

This is a reposting of something I composed late last Christmas regarding "The Date of Christmas"...

This post was directly inspired by something I read on Frank Weathers' great blog, Why I am Catholic, "Because Tradition Says December 25 is When Christ Was Born."  When I read that, I immediately thought about what I've pretty much accepted all my adult life, that we don't really know at what time of the year Jesus was born, that the 25 December date is just tradition that owes more to the ancient Roman festival of Saturnalia as well as the feast of the sun-god Mithras than anything specifically Christian.  In that entry for 23 December, Weathers doesn't really give much in the way of argument, but does give some good links, one in particular dealing with just that question of pagan antecedents:  In "The Dating of Christmas," his entry for 18 December, the blogger for Roma Locuta Est reports on some of Pope Benedict XVI's attempts to reinstill some of the cosmic significance to our understanding of the events of Our Lord's life and death and effectively refutes the idea.  But it's the first Anonymous comment to that blog entry that I found particularly intriguing, that there is indeed Biblical evidence to support tradition and the customary date.

I've done a little more Internet research and come across the following article, which I'll briefly outline:  "Christmas Day:  Was Jesus Really Born on December 25th," by John J. Parsons.

Consider the event of the Archangel Gabriel appearing to the priest Zechariah, foretelling the birth of John the Baptist:

"In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, of the division of Abijah....  Now while [Zechariah] was serving as priest before God when his division was on duty, according to the custom of the priesthood, it fell to him by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense.  ... And there appeared to him an angel of the Lord...."  (Luke 1:5, 8-9, 11 Revised Standard Version-Catholic Edition).

"The division of Abijah" was one of 24 groups of priests entrusted with fulfilling temple duties according to a rotating schedule through the year, on a weekly basis from Sabbath to Sabbath.  Each would serve twice a year according to a set schedule.  (Three major festivals would round out the year.)  The division of Abijah served during the eighth course, which because of the major festivals of Passover and Shavuot occurred during the tenth week of the Jewish year beginning round about the Spring Equinox.  It would then come around again 24 weeks later.  Remember that the Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar depending on the nearest Sabbath to the Spring Equinox, so the specific dates vary in our modern calendar.  In any case, Gabriel appeared to Zechariah sometime around June or December according to our modern calendar.