The thought occurred to me this morning that I had no idea what Boxing Day is actually about. While I moved to the USA as a 7 year old, I'm English so people expect me to know. When I was young someone told me that it was just about putting things away the day after Christmas. You know, boxing it all up! Not sure if dad told me that or someone else. Not sure if someone was just trying to get me to clean up, or maybe just joking, but I took it for granted that this was the truth and never looked into it until today. Awkward!
Today I wondered for some reason. I wondered enough to send me on a search in an effort to be educated correctly. While this is not a holiday recognized in America, thankfully the internet knows no borders. So if you don't care about Boxing Day, stop reading now, but you never know when it might come in handy in a trivia game.
Boxing Day it turns out has a few origin stories and legends around it. The Oxford English Dictionary gives the first attribution in Britain in the 1830s defining it as "the first weekday after Christmas Day, observed as a holiday on which postmen, errand boys, and servants of various kinds expect to receive a "Christmas Box." Upon further investigation this Christmas box includeded money or presents as thanks for good service - the early form of a Christmas bonus it seems! Other posts I read talked of wealthy families giving their servants gifts and time off after having worked on Christmas Day. It seems I might have seen something like this in an episode of Downton Abbey, but it didn't stick!
The second ties this tradition to the church and the giving of alms to the poor. As families came to Christmas service or to Christmas Mass, offerings would be collected for the poor in the area, and the day after Christmas the local priests and clergy would distribute these gifts, perhaps in small boxes, to those in need in the community.
Whatever the truth is, the holiday itself is about giving back, but unfortunately that tradition has gone sideways. These days the holiday in the UK is basically a version of our Black Friday after Thanksgiving. A day for massive sales, lines around the corners to get the best deals possible on whatever you didn't get for Christmas, a basic shopping frenzy. Disappointing given the original intent of the holiday.
The investigative bunny trail then led me round the corner to St. Stephen's Day, or the Feast of St. Stephen, also celebrated the day after Christmas. St. Stephen's Day is meant to commemorate the martyrdom of St. Stephen from Acts 7:54-60. We are moved from the joy and peace of Christmas Day to the suffering of a martyr for his faith. An ancient Catholic Matins still used today says it like this:
Yesterday the Lord was born on earth, that Stephen might be born in heaven; he entered into the world that Stephen might enter the heavens.
The juxtaposition of joy and suffering is not unusual in Scripture, even at Christmas we rejoice and mourn at the same time, knowing that the birth of Christ will also lead to his Passion and death.
So that is what St. Stephen's Day is actually about in church history and yet St. Stephen's Day and Boxing Day, both celebrated on December 26th seem to have merged in a strange way. In popular culture St. Stephen's Day is a little known holiday, yet it is kept alive just barely because of the Christmas carol written in 1835 by John Mason Neale, capturing a legend about a Duke in Bohemia in the tenth century that you will know as "Good King Wenceslas." You may not remember the words well, but it begins:
Good King Wenceslas once looked out on the Feast of Stephen
When the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even
Brightly shone the moon that night though the frost was cruel
When a poor man came in sight, gathering winter fuel.
The carol goes on to describe the good king taking his page boy out into the cruel weather to bring food and supplies to the poor man to make sure he dined well and was warm. St. Stephen's Day has come to be more associated with the giving spirit of King Wenceslas than the martyrdom of Stephen in Acts.
During the excursion into the cruel frost, the page boy is pretty sure he is going to freeze to death and be unable to continue the journey. The good king advises the boy to "mark his footsteps and tread in them boldly" to make navigating the hard journey easier. The final verse reads like this:
In his master's step he trod, where the snow lay dinted
Heat was in the very sod which the Saint had printed
Therefore, Christian men, be sure, wealth or rank possessing
Ye who now will bless the poor shall yourselves find blessing.
What an amazing image. Not only did the good King go in search of the poor man to provide for him, but he made the way easier for his faithful servant by literally treading down the snow, walking the steps first and asking his servant to follow in his footsteps. Sounds a little like the way Jesus asks us to follow in His footsteps as we live out our lives, knowing that He has walked the journey before us and made the impossible ground easier to navigate.
So Christmas boxes, giving back, and legends of good kings come together December 26th on this holiday we call Boxing Day.
What it absolutely doesn't mean is that it is time to pack up all the Christmas decorations!
I'm curious how many of you knew what Boxing Day was. Am I alone in my ignorance? I'll be laying awake tonight wondering who led me so far astray!
