What Really Happened at the Christmas Truce of 1914?

As I travel to visit family this Christmas Eve, the low fog and dense clouds that have plagued Michigan for the past week or so, have just cleared.

The full moon here caught me by surprise. Sometimes called a “cold moon” or “long night moon” it reminded me of a story you’ve likely heard before.

The Christmas Truce of 1914

This story, heavily mythologized at this point, is by far one of my favorite stories of the holiday season… Muppet Christmas Carol notwithstanding.

It’s my favorite because it shows that humans are not doomed to succumb to their evolutionary instincts for territoriality and blindly following leaders.

It’s my favorite because it shows that miracles can still happen, even on the then-increasingly secular 20th Century battlefield.

But what really happened that Christmas Day in 1914, and what does it tell us about the future of humanity?

In the summer of 1914, the guns of August raged across the pastoral fields of France and Belgium.

Through the fall, the Great War was not at all what we collectively imagine when we think of World War I. In those early months, it was a war of maneuver, like the mad dash for the sea, the Miracle on the Marne, and the first clashes…