INSULT TO INJURY: A CHRISTMAS WISH: DONA NOBIS PACEM, GRANT US PEACE

When Mrs. Terhune approached my mother with an idea for the church's annual Christmas pageant, it was, I am sure, with the best of intentions.

She smiled as warmly as she could, handed my mother a handwritten copy of a Christmas poem and announced that the pageant would be complete if my brother Jim and I would recite the poem at the beginning of the program.

Jim and I were, after all, twin boys, which made us something of a curiosity to a lot of people in the congregation. And Mrs. Terhune reasoned it would be a perfect way to begin the Christmas pageant, with the two of us welcoming the crowd to our celebration of the birth of the savior.

Mom, a good church-going woman who knew Jim and me a lot better than Mrs. Terhune did, was a bit apprehensive about providing her rambunctious 4-year-old duo with an audience. But finally, reluctantly and completely against her better judgment, Mom agreed.

The poem was a short one, probably no longer than four lines. But for me, a 4-year-old boy struggling to memorize it, the verse might as well have been "Beowulf" or Goethe's "Faust" in the original German.

Fortunately for me, Jim had always been fairly proficient at memorizing lines. He learned them rather quickly and easily, allowing me to piggyback on him when we were called upon to recite.

During rehearsals, I would nudge him with my elbow and whisper, "You start." He would begin the poem and I would chime in about a half a beat later, repeating his words and sounding like Little Sir Echo. It was, in my mind, the perfect system.

On the night of the Christmas program, the church sanctuary, decked in evergreen and candles and the familiar symbols of Christmas, was packed. The other children in the program were dressed in their Christmas costumes, ready to portray Mary, Joseph, the three wise men, the shepherds and the multitude of heavenly hosts. The nativity would come to life.

But before the Christmas story could be re-enacted, Jim and I, outfitted in corduroy suits and clip-on bow ties, had to stand before the crowd and recite our poem. Pushed out on center stage by Mrs. Terhune, we looked at the audience and gulped in unison.

"You start," I said in a loud stage whisper, nudging Jim in the ribs.

But he didn't respond as he had in practice.

"No, you start," he ordered, nudging back.

"NO," I said, my voice growing desperate, "you start."

"No, YOU start," he repeated.

I don't remember who threw the first punch, but I do know he hit me and I slugged him, he pushed me and I kicked him. Bites were exchanged. In the end, we were both battered, bruised and bawling.

The roars of laughter from the congregation did nothing to quell our anger and-or assuage our pain. Sobbing, I ran to one of my older sisters and Jim to another. And our parents, who had tried to raise their offspring to be polite, respectful children, slumped down in the pews and tried to looked childless.

And so it goes.

In the intervening years, I have searched in vain for some deeper meaning to that skirmish between my brother and me. None seems forthcoming.

All that remains is the gnawing thought that even in the season that proclaims peace on earth, goodwill toward all, there is always the clamor of strife and the din of battle; even in a time that promises the wolf shall lie down with the lamb, there is the ever present threat that conflict will devour us.

In the two millennia that have passed since that first Christmas morn, we have yet to learn the lessons. Our silent night is disturbed by the echoes of distant missiles. The goodwill among men is crushed by the anger that divides us.

"You start," we seem to say to each other with a nudge.

"No, you start," comes back the reply with a harder nudge. And the fight begins.

But I have not given up completely.

Yes, the Christmas melee between my brother and me will always be a part church and family folklore. (I can't even visit that church without some gentle old soul reminding me of the fight.) Still, the anger that was there between the two of us has long passed. We have not fought in years.

Perhaps this is the lesson from that Christmas pageant -- that heavenly peace begins not between nations or races, between corporate bodies or governments, but with tiny steps between individuals seeking reconciliation.

And a little child shall lead them.

~Jeffrey Jackson is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.