Christmas Memories 2025

I originally wrote this post back in 2011, and like to reprise it from time to time. It's amazing how these memories have stayed with me all these years.

At 86 years of age, I still have wonderful memories of Christmas. For me it is hard to imagine what life would have been like without Christmas. It is true that most of these memories have been blurred together by the passage of time—trimming the tree on Christmas eve, children around the tree opening presents on Christmas day, and sitting down with the whole family for Christmas dinner.


Some memories do stand out. Many years ago I went to Victoria’s Secret to buy a pair of pajamas for my wife only to be told that the sale price included two pairs of panties that I would have to pick out. Going back further, I remember standing in a mall after my first year as a struggling mutual fund and insurance salesman and calling my office (there were no cell phones then) to see if my commission check would be large enough to buy presents for my wife and five small children. It was.


Going back to my own childhood, I remember my grandmother and grandfather making zeppoles and other Italian pastries in their tiny kitchen. Never mind granite countertops, their old kitchen had no countertops at all. The kitchen table and the stove top somehow managed for the task of working the dough before dropping it into the boiling oil to cook the delicious Christmas confections.


However, one memory stands out above all the others. My wife and I had moved to Connecticut so that I could take a teaching position in a small college in Fairfield. My first year's salary was about $6000. With the help of a down payment from my dad, we bought a small house for $21,000 back in 1967 after the birth of our second child. Two years later on Christmas eve both of our boys had an attack of asthmatic bronchitis. This had happened before but our usual remedy of taking them into the bathroom, turning on the hot water in the shower, and making the room into a steam room did not work this time.


With reluctance we called our pediatrician on the night before Christmas. He volunteered to come to the house. House calls were not unusual in those days but it was Christmas eve and he was a young man with a family of his own. Still, he came and stayed and ministered to the boys for what seemed like hours. Finally, he recommended that we take the youngest to the hospital. A wonderful neighbor volunteered to baby sit for us and we drove to the hospital where my wife spent the evening with little Edward.


Next day all was well and mother and child returned home. We can never forget Dr. Cahill for what he did that night. To top it all off, he refused to bill us precisely because it was Christmas.

Happy 60th birthday to Ed and Merry Christmas to all. ###.

Peace on Earth

 

The birth of Jesus is recorded in the gospels of Matthew and Luke, but they only have one fact in common: that the Holy Family was in Bethlehem, the birthplace of King David, when Jesus was born.

Nevertheless, scholars now agree that the accounts have a firm basis in history and complement each other. Modern biblical scholars argue  that the birth occurred in what we used to call 7 B.C. The gospel of Matthew says that Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod who died in 4 B.C. The gospel of Luke states that the birth occurred during a Roman census ordered when Quirinus, a Roman official, was governor of Syria. This official was governor in 6 A.D. but now we know that he was also governor between 10 B.C. and 7 B.C. During both terms he ordered a census.

The date Is also confirmed by astronomy. It appears that the star followed by the Three Kings or Magi is no pious fiction. There is no record of a comet or super nova in 7 B. C., but in the seventeenth century, famed astronomer  Johannes Kepler claimed that there had been a conspicuous conjunction of the two largest planets, Jupiter and Saturn, in the area of the constellation Pisces visible for months in 7 B.C. Only in the twentieth century did scientists confirm Kepler’s observation.

What about the Magi? Historians now doubt that they were kings but claim that they were astrologers (scientists) who were keen observers of the stars and planets. In fact, scholars now believe that there were Jewish astrologers living in the large Jewish community in Persia who were continually searching the skies for signs of the coming Messiah. 

What about Bethlehem? Joseph would have been required to travel with his wife the 70 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem, the hometown of his family to register for the census. The small town situated on a hill six miles from Jerusalem would have been crowded with others coming for the census. It would have been very likely that they would have had to stay in a stable or cave used to shelter animals.

There were certainly grazing fields around the town where shepherds could be watching their flocks, but scholars now believe that the flocks would not have been grazing at the onset of winter. The gospel accounts do not specify an exact date, and it seems most likely that December 25 is a later addition to the story.

Nevertheless, after all these years, it is hard to imagine a better date to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Winter is coming on, and we are faced with three months of cold and gloom. What’s wrong with a ray of light to pierce the darkness?

The birth of Jesus over 2000 years ago was an actual event that took place in a specific time and place. It is confirmed by historians and scientists. No matter what you believe, you cannot doubt that it changed the world forever.

Maybe we still have not achieved peace on earth and goodwill toward men, but we can always hope. Years ago I heard this lovely rendition of "Peace on Earth" by famed country singer Vince Gill, and his daughter Jenny, now a star in her own right. Click on this link or view the video below.

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Note: The image above is a painting by the Venetian Renaissance artist Giorgione. It is usually called The Three Philosophers, but I agree with those who believe it depicts the Magi when they first behold the star.

 

I Are a Capitalist

A headline in the Wall Street Journal this week read: "401(k)s Are Minting Millionaires." The article explained that rising stock market prices over the past three years have created hundreds and thousands of "moderate millionaires." Money manager Fidelity, for example, reported that 654,000 of their 401k clients had balances over 1 Million. Benefits manager Alright reported that 3.2% of more than three million accounts tracked had balances over 1 Million. T. Rowe Price reported that the number of  retirement accounts over 1 Million had doubled from 2022 to 2023. Finally, investment giant Vanguard reported that of the millions of plans it administers, a record 88% were invested in the stock market.

A table in the article indicated that even the staid Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) had grown over 40% in the past three years. It is not hard to imagine that the number of plans with balances in the 500,000 to 1,000,000 range have grown accordingly, and that these younger people will also be millionaires by the time they retire.

In an encyclical letter written shortly after he became Pope. the late Pope 

Francis bemoaned income inequality and 'trickle down economic theories," but still said:  

“It is not the task of the Pope to offer a detailed and complete analysis of contemporary reality, but I do exhort all the communities to an “ever watchful scrutiny of the signs of the times.”

As an ordinary Catholic I would like to offer an anecdotal and incomplete analysis of the signs of the times based on my own lifetime experience. 

I have to confess that I am a Capitalist. I even remember the year I became a Capitalist. In 1965 I was hired, right out of graduate school, as an Instructor to teach History at Sacred Heart University, a small, recently opened institution of higher learning in Fairfield, Connecticut. 

Sacred Heart could hardly be called a university in those days. It was a small liberal arts college with the distinction of being the only Catholic college in the country staffed and run entirely by laymen and women. When I arrived the school was only in its third year of existence and the faculty was still in the process of formation.

Anyway, a few weeks after classes started the Business Manager of the school approached me to ask if I wanted to sign up for the fledgling school’s retirement plan. He explained that if I agreed to allocate a small percentage of my pay toward retirement, the university would match my contribution. 

My starting salary back in 1965 was about $6000 and I had a wife and one small child. Retirement was the last thing on my mind. Nevertheless, it seemed like a good deal especially since the university would match it. If I reduced my pay by 6% or $30 per month, the university would add that much to my account. Because it was a pre-tax contribution, the reduction in take home pay would only be about $25 per month.

After I agreed to sign up, the Business Manager told me that I would have a choice of where my small contributions would be invested. Sacred Heart University had joined with the great majority of colleges and universities in the country to utilize the services of the Teachers’ Retirement and Annuity Association (TIAA) to administer and manage its retirement plan. The university would deduct the contribution and send it along with their matching contribution to TIAA where it would be invested as I chose. 

At that time, there were only two investment choices. The first was a fixed or guaranteed account like a bank account. The principal in the account was guaranteed by the insurance company and it would earn a fixed rate of interest. The second option was a variable account where my contributions would be invested in a diversified portfolio of common stock. In this account, there were no guarantees. The principal value would fluctuate according to the vagaries of the stock market, and there could be no predicting what the actual rate of return would be.

Like the majority of teachers I elected to split my retirement equally between the fixed and variable account. I was not a student of finance or the stock market, and just decided to do what most others seemed to be doing. I had no idea that in electing to put half in the variable account that I was becoming a Capitalist.

The variable account was a relatively new creation. It was a mutual fund but since it was run by an insurance company, it was called a variable annuity. After years of lobbying TIAA had finally convinced the Government to allow insurance companies to get into the booming mutual fund business. TIAA’s variable annuity fund was called the College Retirement Equity Fund (CREF), and it would in time become one of the largest pools of investment dollars in the world.

When my little contribution went into CREF each month, I became a part, although very small, owner of practically every major company in the USA. Whatever their political feelings or philosophy, thousands and thousands of other college teachers throughout the country were also becoming Capitalists. We all were becoming owners of a slice of the American pie. Moreover, the government agreed not to tax our contributions or their earnings until we retired.  

Over the ensuing years the features of this type of retirement plan would be extended to a larger and larger segment of American workers. Self-employed individuals were allowed to use so-called Keogh plans. Corporations were allowed to set up tax favored 401k plans for their employees. Finally, the creation of IRAs enabled practically every American to have a stake in the American economy.

It’s true that few of us will have the income or assets of Rock stars like Taylor Swift, TV personalities like Oprah, or athletes like LeBron James. But more than anywhere else in the world, we do have the opportunity to acquire and keep property. We can even buy and sell shares in the companies we work for.

 

Trickle down economics may be an odious theory but I don’t call what has gone on in America in the past sixty years trickle down economics. It is something else and whatever you call it, it has worked to raise the standard of living in this country to the highest that has ever been seen in the world. Other countries have an emigration problem. Only we seem to have an immigration problem.

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Note: After seven years I left Sacred Heart University in 1972 at the age of 33. At the time, my retirement balance was about $10,000, but the only way I could get my hands on the money was to take a lifetime monthly income. Fifty three years later I am still receiving checks. The annual payout from the fixed account is about $500, and the payout from the variable account is now over $2000.

Mortgage Our Future

My wife and I bought our first home in Fairfield CT back in 1966 for $21,000. It certainly was not affordable for us. I was 27 years old and my salary as an Assistant Professor at a small Catholic college was only about $6500 per year, or about $540 per month. My wife, an RN, could not work because our second child had been born six months before. 

Indeed, only a gift of $2000 from my father enabled us to come up with the down payment, and somehow a local bank approved us for a $19,000, 30-year mortgage to cover the balance of the purchase price. We had no choice. No mortgage, no home.

Actually, it turned out to be a no-brainer.  The monthly mortgage payment, with taxes and insurance, was about what we had been previously paying for rent, but now we had a home of our own to live in and care for. 

I did not realize it at the time but in taking on a mortgage loan we had entered into a partnership with the bank. We really were joint owners of the property. What were the terms of the partnership? The bank put up the capital and required us to make monthly payments of principal and interest. We were also responsible for paying for homeowner’s insurance and local property taxes that the bank conveniently lumped into the monthly mortgage payment. Any improvements or repairs would be our responsibility.

Initially, it seemed that the capitalist bank got the most out of the partnership, but as time went by, it turned out to be a great deal for us. Twelve years later our family had grown, and I had had a career change that was turning out well, and so we decided to buy a larger home. We sold our house for about $80,000, paid back the remaining principal, that was probably still around $17,000, to our bank partner, and pocketed about $60,000, a substantial increase in equity over our original $2000 down payment. 

Most of that equity went as a down payment on a larger home nearby that cost about $90,000. Now we had a new bank partner, another friendly capitalist institution that was willing to invest in us and our property. The terms of the partnership were much the same. 

Thirty years later with our six children grown we sold that house for about $500,000 and downsized to a small ranch house that would be more suitable for an older couple. Even though all those years had gone by, there was still a large principal balance on my mortgage because I had refinanced a couple of times as the house increased in value to help put our children through college.

Although still nearby, the ranch house was in a better neighborhood and cost about $600,000.  Even though I was about to retire, we still had a mortgage of about $250,000 and will probably continue this latest partnership with a bank until death or illness forces us to sell.  I still see no reason to pay it off. Taxes and insurance costs keep rising, but our monthly housing cost is comparable to current rental rates in Fairfield. 

Looking back now I still believe that our experience with capitalism was a positive one. The banks lent us their depositor’s money, and we never missed a payment. We labored to take care of the property and maintain its value. In the process the bank got its principal back with interest, and we were able to increase our equity. Both sides in the partnership profited. We were not alone. I suspect that home ownership is more widespread in the United States than anywhere else in the world.  ###