Arts and Culture
Opinion: Remembering the Message of Christmas


Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr.
On Wednesday, Christmas will be celebrated by millions of people across this country and across the world. Joy surrounds the holiday, with music in the air, lights on homes and lampposts, families gathering, presents exchanged and blessings shared.
For some, Christmas is a difficult time — for the poor, for separated families, for the lonely, for the imprisoned and the sick. Each year at this time, I use this column to recall the true meaning of Christmas.
Christmas is literally the mass for Christ, marking the birth of Jesus. He was born under occupation. Joseph and Mary were ordered to go far from home to register with authorities. The innkeeper told Joseph there was no room at the inn. Jesus was born on a cold night in a stable, lying in a manger, an “at-risk baby.” His earthly father was a carpenter. Santa Claus wasn’t around — he is an invention of 19th century Europe.
Jesus was born at a time of great misery and turmoil, with his country under Roman occupation. Prophets predicted that a new Messiah was coming, a King of Kings, one who would rout the occupiers and free the people. Many expected a mighty warrior— like the superheroes of today’s movies — who would mobilize an army to defeat Rome’s occupying legions.
Fearing the prophecy, the Roman King Herod ordered the “massacre of the innocents,” the slaughter of all boys two and under in Bethlehem and the nearby region.
Jesus confounded both Herod’s fears and the peoples’ hopes. He was a man of peace, not of war. He gathered disciples, not soldiers. He began his ministry by quoting Isaiah 62:1: “The Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.” We will be judged, he taught us, by how we treat “the least of these,” by how we treat the stranger on the Jericho Road. He called on us to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to care for the sick, to offer aid to the refugee.
It’s an extraordinary story. Jesus was a liberator, but by his words and his example, not his sword. He converted rather than conquered. He accumulated no worldly wealth. He threw the money lenders from the temple. During his ministry, he owned no home, no land, and had no regular paycheck. His time with us was too brief, and he was crucified for his ministry.
And yet, he succeeded beyond all expectation to transform the world. The Prince of Peace, he taught us that peace is not the absence of violence; it is the presence of justice and righteousness.
These days, the mass for Christ too often is viewed as a holiday and a payday for Santa, rather than a holy day, more secular than sacred. It is a time of sales, shopping and Santa, when its focus should be on the poorest among us. It is a time to stop a moment and take stock of where we are in light of the mission to bring “good news to the poor.”
There is good news: unemployment is down, poverty is down, incomes have slowly begun to rise. We continue to lock up more people than any nation in the world, but at both the state and federal level, small steps are being taken to reduce the number of nonviolent offenders who are incarcerated.
But surely, we have a long way to go. We are ignoring a climate crisis that threatens all of God’s creation. The U.S. continues to waste lives and literally trillions in wars without end and without apparent purpose. Inequality is at record extremes, and the tax cut Congress passed is making it worse.
Millions still struggle in this rich country to secure adequate food to eat, yet the administration is cutting support for food stamps that allow the working poor to feed their families. On our borders, the administration descended to tearing babies away from their mothers and keeping so many locked up that we have no facilities to house them. Health care, a basic human right, remains unaffordable for too many. Homelessness is rising, as adequate housing is priced out of the reach of more and more in our major cities.
Jesus was not a partisan, but his birth was immensely political — both in the expectations of the people and the fears of the occupiers. Instead of turning us on one another, he called us to our highest selves. We should not let the deeper meaning of Christmas be lost in the wrappings.
In Chicago on Christmas Day, I will go with my family — as we do every year — to visit the prisoners at the Cook County Jail, one of the largest jails in this country. That reflects the real meaning of the Christmas story.
In this secular age, let us remember the message of Christmas. Jesus demonstrated the astonishing power of faith, hope and charity, the importance of love. He showed that people of conscience can make a difference, even against the most powerful oppressor.
He demonstrated the strength of summoning our better angels, rather than rousing our fears or feeding our divisions. This Christmas, this surely is a message to remember.
Merry Christmas, everybody.
Activism
New Oakland Moving Forward
This week, several socially enterprising members of this group visited Oakland to explore ways to collaborate with local stakeholders at Youth Empowerment Partnership, the Port of Oakland, Private Industry Council, Oakland, Mayor-elect Barbara Lee, the Oakland Ballers ownership group, and the oversight thought leaders in the Alameda County Probation Department.

By Post Staff
Since the African American Sports and Entertainment Group purchased the City of Oakland’s share of the Alameda County Coliseum Complex, we have been documenting the positive outcomes that are starting to occur here in Oakland.
Some of the articles in the past have touched on actor Blair Underwood’s mission to breathe new energy into the social fabric of Oakland. He has joined the past efforts of Steph and Ayesha Curry, Mistah Fab, Green Day, Too Short, and the Oakland Ballers.
This week, several socially enterprising members of this group visited Oakland to explore ways to collaborate with local stakeholders at Youth Empowerment Partnership, the Port of Oakland, Private Industry Council, Oakland, Mayor-Elect Barbara Lee, the Oakland Ballers ownership group, and the oversight thought leaders in the Alameda County Probation Department.
These visits represent a healthy exchange of ideas and plans to resuscitate Oakland’s image. All parties felt that the potential to impact Oakland is right in front of us. Most recently, on the back side of these visits, the Oakland Ballers and Blair Underwood committed to a 10-year lease agreement to support community programs and a community build-out.
So, upward and onward with the movement of New Oakland.
Arts and Culture
BOOK REVIEW: Love, Rita: An American Story of Sisterhood, Joy, Loss, and Legacy
When Bridgett M. Davis was in college, her sister Rita was diagnosed with lupus, a disease of the immune system that often left her constantly tired and sore. Davis was a bit unfazed, but sympathetic to Rita’s suffering and also annoyed that the disease sometimes came between them. By that time, they needed one another more than ever.

By Terri Schlichenmeyer
Author: Bridgett M. Davis, c.2025, Harper, $29.99, 367 Pages
Take care.
Do it because you want to stay well, upright, and away from illness. Eat right, swallow your vitamins and hydrate, keep good habits and hygiene, and cross your fingers. Take care as much as you can because, as in the new book, “Love, Rita” by Bridgett M. Davis, your well-being is sometimes out of your hands.
It was a family story told often: when Davis was born, her sister, Rita, then four years old, stormed up to her crying newborn sibling and said, ‘Shut your … mouth!’
Rita, says Davis, didn’t want a little sister then. She already had two big sisters and a neighbor who was somewhat of a “sister,” and this baby was an irritation. As Davis grew, the feeling was mutual, although she always knew that Rita loved her.
Over the years, the sisters tried many times not to fight — on their own and at the urging of their mother — and though division was ever present, it eased when Rita went to college. Davis was still in high school then, and she admired her big sister.
She eagerly devoured frequent letters sent to her in the mail, signed, “Love, Rita.”
When Davis was in college herself, Rita was diagnosed with lupus, a disease of the immune system that often left her constantly tired and sore. Davis was a bit unfazed, but sympathetic to Rita’s suffering and also annoyed that the disease sometimes came between them. By that time, they needed one another more than ever.
First, they lost their father. Drugs then invaded the family and addiction stole two siblings. A sister and a young nephew were murdered in a domestic violence incident. Their mother was devastated; Rita’s lupus was an “added weight of her sorrow.”
After their mother died of colon cancer, Rita’s lupus took a turn for the worse.
“Did she even stand a chance?” Davis wrote in her journal.
“It just didn’t seem possible that she, someone so full of life, could die.”
Let’s start here: once you get past the prologue in “Love, Rita,” you may lose interest. Maybe.
Most of the stories that author Bridgett M. Davis shares are mildly interesting, nothing rare, mostly commonplace tales of growing up in the 1960s and ’70s with a sibling. There are a lot of these kinds of stories, and they tend to generally melt together. After about fifty pages of them, you might start to think about putting the book aside.
But don’t. Not quite yet.
In between those everyday tales, Davis occasionally writes about being an ailing Black woman in America, the incorrect assumptions made by doctors, the history of medical treatment for Black people (women in particular), attitudes, and mythologies. Those passages are now and then, interspersed, but worth scanning for.
This book is perhaps best for anyone with the patience for a slow-paced memoir, or anyone who loves a Black woman who’s ill or might be ill someday. If that’s you and you can read between the lines, then “Love, Rita” is a book to take in carefully.
Activism
Faces Around the Bay: Author Karen Lewis Took the ‘Detour to Straight Street’
“My life has been a roller-coaster with an unlimited ride wristband! I was raised in Berkeley during the time of Ron Dellums, the Black Panthers, and People’s Park. I was a Hippie kid, my Auntie cut off all our hair so we could wear the natural styles like her and Angela Davis.

By Barbara Fluhrer
I met Karen Lewis on a park bench in Berkeley. She wrote her story on the spot.
“My life has been a roller-coaster with an unlimited ride wristband! I was raised in Berkeley during the time of Ron Dellums, the Black Panthers, and People’s Park. I was a Hippie kid, my Auntie cut off all our hair so we could wear the natural styles like her and Angela Davis.
I got married young, then ended up getting divorced, raising two boys into men. After my divorce, I had a stroke that left me blind and paralyzed. I was homeless, lost in a fog with blurred vision.
Jesus healed me! I now have two beautiful grandkids. At 61, this age and this stage, I am finally free indeed. Our Lord Jesus Christ saved my soul. I now know how to be still. I lay at his feet. I surrender and just rest. My life and every step on my path have already been ordered. So, I have learned in this life…it’s nice to be nice. No stressing, just blessings. Pray for the best and deal with the rest.
Nobody is perfect, so forgive quickly and love easily!”
Lewis’ book “Detour to Straight Street” is available on Amazon.
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