Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol has enjoyed incredible popularity since its first publication in 1843. Many readers curl up with the famous little ghost story every Christmas season, and a number of our students at Mount Hope did exactly that shortly before break. Most people, even if they haven’t read the book itself, still know the basic story of Scrooge, the Cratchit family, and the three peculiar Christmas ghosts. Because of the book’s widespread fame, to say nothing of the plethora of stage and film adaptations, it’s not too surprising that A Christmas Carol often carries something of a secular connotation. After all, you don’t have to be a Christian to like generosity, charity, goodwill, and the pinch of the mysterious supernatural that everyone loves this time of year. In the book, the actual Christmas account in Luke 2 is hardly mentioned. And besides, Dickens often seems more concerned with righting social wrongs (indeed, a popular theme of his) than in presenting some kind of picture of the Gospel. But A Christmas Carol isn’t an empty secular story that we read only because it’s a classic. The thoughtful Christian reader can get much more out of this splendid book than might first be expected.
First of all, Dickens sets up an implicit Christian culture in A Christmas Carol. He takes it for granted that his characters belong to Christian life and society: Families love one another, marriage and children are desirable, and people go to church on Christmas Day. Perhaps the best indication of this “Christian backdrop” comes during an impromptu speech from Scrooge’s nephew Fred: “ ‘I am sure I have always thought of Christmas-time, when it has come round—apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that—as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time.’ ” Through the voice of Fred, Dickens prods his readers to consider whether anything “belonging to” Christmas can exist apart from “its sacred name and origin”—that is, whether there can be any kindness, charity, pleasure, etc., apart from the birth of Christ. And Christian readers reply, Of course not! There can be no love for others, no claims like Jacob Marley’s that “Mankind…and charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence were all my business,” unless God in Christ has first loved us and come to dwell with us. There is no goodness in secular “Christmas” without the true Christian Christmas.
A second and much more explicit Christian theme in A Christmas Carol is found in the adventures of Mr. Scrooge himself. Throughout the story, the ghosts’ entire purpose is to turn Scrooge from his selfish ways and lead him to amend his life. By the final visit, Scrooge realizes that his terrifying and painful journeys are in fact for his benefit: “Ghost of the Future!” he exclaimed, “I fear you more than any specter I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart.” In the end, the ghosts succeed: Scrooge repents and becomes a different man! And how clearly Dickens presents the subsequent delights of a happy conscience. When he woke on Christmas Day, Scrooge “found that everything could yield him pleasure. He had never dreamed that any walk—that any thing—could give him so much happiness.” To the Christian, who knows that Christ is the source of a good conscience, this image is as familiar as it is beautiful. The Christian can see, in the whole story of Scrooge, a picture of God’s mercy in bringing sinners to repentance and giving them true joy.
Like all great literature, A Christmas Carol upholds elements of truth about God and man. Because of this, Christian readers can see images of the story of salvation and the blessings of a Christian life. A Christmas Carol is not just a secular story, but a story for Christians, and one that we can most enjoy!
In Christ,
Miss Hahn
