“Virginia, Your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible to their little minds.”-Francis Pharcellus Church, 1897
We see our times as cynical and skeptical, as well, but the cynicism of the end of the Nineteenth Century had a different onus. The writer of this famous seasonal passage had been a war correspondent during the Civil War, observing the horror of the battlefield and sending back the gory details to the mutually horrified and the mutually curious. We as a society have talked about several instances in the history of this Republic where this country lost its innocence, but one could make a strong case that the catastrophe of 1861-1865 could be the most prominent of all.
One of the reasons I am a pacifist Quaker is that I see the influence of war in ways that go well beyond military matters, beyond bullets, cannons, and wounds. The psychological toil upon the innocent bystander and civilian itself is extreme and destructive. But to examine more closely the most prominent creations of armed combat, the American Civil War created casualties and suffering on a scale that would seem obscene to the modern age. As famed historian Shelby Foote noted, often nearly one-third of those engaged in a battle perished, one pitched conflict after another. Hope and faith were in short supply during the war, soldier and civilian alike, and these dour feelings lingered throughout the whole of the generation who remembered and lived them, never allowed to forget.
According to an anecdote on the radio program The Rest of the Story, Church was a hardened cynic and an atheist who had little patience for superstitious beliefs, did not want to write the editorial, and refused to allow his name to be attached to the piece.
And yet, Church affirmed the reason for the season, the existence of Jesus Christ and God. How, you ask? Let us return to the editorial in question.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.
Some of us have claimed to never see God, nor to feel his presence. Those of us who believe know that God is present in his own way and in his own time, frustrating and exasperating as that may be. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. And yet, they exist. Debunk it all to your heart’s content, but I personally celebrate the birth of the savior of the world. He and the Holy Spirit persists no matter how cynical we grow and how much we doubt. There is something in the human condition that wants to believe, that wants to preserve a sense of magic, no matter how illogical it may be, no matter how much reason wishes to combat it.
Francis Pharcellus Church may have been a hardened atheist. He may have been forced to write an article that, ironically enough, has been reprinted more times than any other column in history. But there must have been some part of him who believed. He was not making up fairy stories or writing fiction, instead he encapsulated the very essence of faith.
Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here, and look at my hands. Put your hand into the wound in my side. Don't be faithless any longer. Believe!"
"My Lord and my God!" Thomas exclaimed. Then Jesus told him, "You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me."