Ebenezer Scrooge in the 21st Century: Finding Meaning in “A Christmas Carol” and Becoming “Unscrooged”

Every year at this time, I listen to the audiobook of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. (Tim Curry narrates the best I have heard in Audible.)

Television has sucked the soul out of Dickens. It has easily cartooned Scrooge.

Scrooge has few, if any, positive qualities. His miserly ways freeze his pitifully paid clerk. Preceded in death by his like-minded partner, he is unchanged by his death.

Anger is his hallmark as much as his greed. He views Christmas (and all holidays) as an excuse to cheat him out of another farthing. With his “Bah, Humbug” bark, he shoos away choirs and the needy. People are an imposition that should hurry to die to “decrease the surplus population.”

The familiar plot is a visit from three spirits who show him his past, present, and future. He sees himself in a spiritual mirror and does not like what he sees. Slowly, he breaks and vows to keep the spirit of Christmas all year.

Scrooge would feel quite at home in today’s society. Politics spews slurs and character assassination. Hatred spills out of more and more social media posts. Even churches seem more concerned with attendance numbers and budget figures than helping and serving people.

Perhaps we need to use this season to become “unscrooged.” (Hopefully, it will not require nighttime specters.)

See life through others’ eyes. When Ebenezer gets a glimpse of the suffering of Tiny Tim, the son of his poor clerk Cratchet, it changes his perspective from scorn to compassion. Look around and ask, “what kind of struggles does that person have?” Become aware of the simple truth that all people confront challenges. Seeing them makes us more open to compassion.

Do anonymous good. The most significant glow in life comes from doing good just for good’s sake. The problem with doing good is that we expect recognition. At the end of the story, Scrooge buys an enormous turkey and has it sent to the Cratchets without him knowing.

Smile more often. One of Ebenezer Scrooge’s salient features was his twisted face which reflected his scorn for people and others. No one can smile and remain angry. Try it. Turn up the corners of your mouth until your soul laughs.

May it be said of us, as Dickens wrote of Scrooge:

“it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!”