A Christmas Tale: He Lost the Taste for War in Tasting a Child's Soup! 
Fr. Stephen Ernst, S.T.
December 1999

This tale is based on an adaptation of a story told among a number of Native American tribes in the northern Midwest as found in Megan McKenna’s Mary, Shadow of Grace. (Orbis Press, Maryknoll, New York). The narrator is the tribe’s holy man, who explains why he left the ways of the warrior, becoming their holy man and lost the taste for war in tasting a child’s soup.

"As a young man, I was a warrior for our people. It was a hard winter, brutally cold for deep snow and ice covered our land. There was little food and many were hungry. I was among those chosen to locate our enemies. With pride, I painted myself for war and traveled three days and three nights over the frozen land searching for the camp of our foes.

"On the third night, hungry and cold, I found a lone teepee in the forest. This is how our enemies camped, spread out in the forest. When attacked they would scatter but later gather at a prearranged spot. I knew I found them and my heart, bursting with pride, rejoiced!

I crept up close to the teepee. There was a tear in its entrance flap so I knelt down to peer inside. I saw a young couple talking by the fire. A young child no more than two was playing nearby. He would stand on his wobbly legs and with a large wooden spoon stir the pot on the fire. He was imitating his elders: he would stir the soup, blow on the spoon, taste it and then stir again. Suddenly he looked straight at me. He was on eye level with me! He saw me spying on them. I was afraid. Then he did something miraculously shocking and unexpected. He put the spoon in the pot, filled it with soup and walked on his stubby little legs over toward me and fed me soup through the torn tent flap. It tasted so good and its warmth warned me.

"I was taken aback. His parents would surely notice. But they were intent on their talk and not paying attention to their child at play. The child waddled back toward the fire and repeated his little ritual. Again and again he returned and fed me soup! I was very hungry and cold! Finally, I slipped away and ran toward my camp. I knew where the enemy was and must tell my people. I ran and ran and ran until I could run no more. Exhausted I sat on a great stone, my mind spinning, pondering what I had seen and what had happened to me.

"It was the child! What child was this? What child would fearlessly feed an enemy soup with a wooden spoon through a tear in the tent flap? What power or Spirit protected this child and taught this "little one" its ways? The child must live. He must not die. What was I to do? I thought of going back and killing the parents and taking the child myself to raise him in our tribe’s ways and wisdom. But no, the child was too young. He needed his own parents and his people’s ways. Finally I knew what to do.

"I returned to the teepee and though painted for war, I entered through the front flap. The very spot where I was fed. The young couple was frightened but I gave signs of peace and was welcomed and seated at the fire. While the father prepared the peace pipe and the mother watched, the young child smiled broadly in recognition. Once again the ritual was enacted: the child stirred the soup pot, blew on the spoon, tasted it, waddled over and fed me the soup. His mother was astounded. I spoke in signs and told them that the child would save their lives this night. We spoke and ate and I told them that I would soon return to my people. There was a war party out that night and they, young and inexperienced were in danger. They must leave when I left. I watched them depart, the young parents walking away and on the mother’s back was their child swaddled, protected from the cold, waving the soup spoon, still smiling at me! Days later, when I returned to our tribe, I learned the camp had been attacked by our war party and many died.

That was many, many winters ago. But I often have thought about that child. What child was that? What power and great Spirit protected him? What would this child grow up to be and do? Whenever I was in trouble and dismayed I prayed to the Spirit that protected that child and always I was cared for and protected. That child now would be a grown man, a man of peace, kindness and hospitality. I often wonder where he is and what he is about. For since that night I have left he old ways of the warrior and become your holy man. I lost my taste for war in the taste of that child’s soup. Nothing has been the same since that night I was fed the great Spirit’s food at the hand of that unknown child. All I know now is that we need that child grown to manhood. We all need that child of peace among us now."

Taste this tale, savor this soup, feel its warmth, be shocked by God’s unexpected and miraculously loving response to us. What Child was that? He was the Christ Child. As human beings we hunger for God and the Christ Child is God’s enfleshed response of loving kindness for each of us. Jesus is God’s hungering for us! In God’s hospitality our hunger is satisfied by one whose skin is our skin. Whose innocent smile, curious glee and stomach-felt laughter becomes our wisdom. His loving, wondering eyes are fixed attentively upon each one of us and our world. It is His hand that feeds us the Spirit’s soup.

It is indeed a wonder to consider that God, the All Loving, All Knowing, All Just, Totally Other and Absolute Mystery has freely in the person of Jesus of Nazareth taken up our humanity, its joys and sorrows, failures and successes and through his birth, mission, passion, death and resurrection defeated forever the power of sin and death. In the Incarnation, this sacred fusion, the Holy Spirit inspires in us the confident hope that all the "Friends of God" will join Christ, Risen and Glorified at his future and end-time kingdom banquet.

Yet this season of Incarnation, Christmas, is also an invitation to the kingdom banquet" here and now". We are invited to taste again the Spirit’s soup of God’s peace, kindness and hospitality. Our free response to this invitation within the context of our God-given nature and abilities is to taste the bitter soup of others’ lives. Taste the tears of those who cry and mourn! Taste the frustration of the poor! Taste the anger of those denied justice! Taste the fear of those living with violence! Taste the pain of the ill and dying! Taste the slavery of those, who despite the blessings of wealth, power or fame are so terribly sad. Taste the shame of those ridiculed and rejected. In tasting through Christ the bitter soup of others’ lives, we feed them and in turn are fed! Thus, the Incarnation leads to Eucharist. This Jubilee Year the church prays the theme: The Eucharist, Gift of Divine Life. In Eucharist we, the sons and daughters of God taste the Divine Life-Giving Bread of Peace, thus losing our taste for war!

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