Driving one summer in the Dolomite Mountain between Northern Italy and Austria in the 1990s, Alice and I passed the barracks of a regiment of Alpini, Italian mountain soldiers. Because of the difficult terrain these soldiers were expected to defend, a prime means of transport was mule back, and that day the soldiers were grooming their animals.  These Alpine troops, sporting Swiss-style caps with a single large feather, are viewed with affection by the Italian people, and our unexpected encounter with these men and their animals, reminded me of a story that I had been told by an old Salesian priest many years before.

            When World War I ended in 1918, Italian-speaking seminarians of the Salesian Order from the Tyrol district of Austria were sent to an institute on the southwest coast of Italy, for their theological studies.  They were an unhappy lot. One year, following midnight Mass, the young men were gathered in the seminary dining room for a middle of the night celebration with Christmas carols and refreshments.

                  One of the Italian seminarians stood up and told a story. Like most young Italians he had been drafted into the army where he was assigned to an Alpini unit guarding a high post in the snowy Dolomite Mountains. On Christmas eve, fighting spontaneously ceased on both sides of the front and the soldiers did what they could to celebrate Christ’s birth. Amidst, the snow-clad peaks and icy, crystal clear air, they sang a Christmas carol. Then from an opposite and equally lonely guard post, a similar carol was heard from a few Austrian troops. Time passed and then footsteps in the snow were heard, and a short time later, Austrian troops came into sight, bringing chocolate as a gift for their Italian counterparts. The soldiers shared with one another what little they had and soon Christmas songs of a single small chorus echoes across the lonely mountain heights. The following day, the cruel and seemingly endless war resumed as before.

            The story told in the seminary dining room was barely finished when another seminarian — an Austrian– burst into tears.  He had been in the Austrian army, he explained, and he also had been assigned to mountain duty along that very same ridge. Indeed, he had been one of the enemy soldiers who had crossed the lines that evening to share what little peace and good will they possessed with their Italian counterparts. The two men embraced, and those present never forgot this event. Whatever animosities had existed between the two groups of seminarians ended that Christmas morning.

            The story illustrates the simple truth that Christmas is the celebration of true peace.  Whatever tranquility the world can offer is a passing thing. The suffering we experience in life short-lived. Christ’s peace, by contrast, is profound and permanent. Our faith tells us that suffering we endure in this life is only a veneer covering a deeper, more abiding reality. On Christmas day, a Savior was born to us, and because of  this “all is calm, all is bright” through time and through eternity.

Peace

Larry Mullaly