The Santa Burn...
Going from warm Texas to freezing Manitoba to celebrate New Year's
January 4, 2025
We just returned from Manitoba, Canada. A month ago when I told my wife we were going to the middle of Manitoba to celebrate New Years, where it gets down to 20 degrees below zero, she said, “Are you crazy?”
After attending the Eclipse Festival and Burning Man in 2024, I began to see the need to study in depth the Western led worldview that is being pressed into the minds of the new generation. This was validated by my trip to the Philippines this past summer, when I noticed the incredibly high volume of children that were losing their native language and growing up being influenced by youtube and social media.
The Burning Man phenomenon is like the “face” of this new age movement, more properly called “The Age of Re-enchantment.” Now that I understand the role that the big event has, I am exploring to understand further its impact, as well as what common attendees do throughout the year. In the whole Burning Man ecosystem, there are hundreds of regional burns at different times. So when we found out about the “Santa Burn” in Manitoba, organized by a friend (whom we went to Burning Man with), I knew that we had to go. But we are from Texas, where it was 86 degrees on New Year’s Eve!
Note that not every regional burn event is necessarily promoting the Age of Re-enchantment worldview. Some, perhaps many, are just a gathering of people to do a fun event and light a bonfire. That’s what this was. We were not trying to make a statement or anything like that – it was just a fun social event, but also an opportunity to shine the light of God’s image and encourage one another (as all social events should be). This is the background of the Santa Burn. At the same time, because it is associated with the big event by calling it a regional burn, it happens to draw in a few people that are connected to that as well.
Coming to Manitoba, besides meeting with our team from Camp of the Unknown God (Acts 17 – our camp name at Burning Man), we knew that we would see some people we had not seen in a long time. We flew into Winnipeg on the 29th, and had a chance to meet up with one of our old friends from when we lived in Carlsbad, New Mexico. We had become friends with her because her son and our son had been playmates when we lived there. This was a fantastic reunion. The last time we had seen her was 22 years ago, when we were in missionary training, and had circled back through Carlsbad to update the church on what we were doing at that time. She and her husband were now living in Winnipeg, so we had a chance to go out to dinner with them. It was a blessed time of encouragement and fellowship.
Then the next day, the 30th, driving West from Winnipeg into the cold countryside of Manitoba, we connected with our friends at their home in the woods, where the event was going to take place. Shortly after we arrived, another couple from Camp of the Unknown God (CUG) showed up. There were still 2 that were missing – our British friend who lives in Scotland (he would not be able to come), and the young farmer from Saskatchewan. After getting settled, we worked that afternoon through New Year’s Eve to help get the area set up for the Santa Burn. This meant hauling wood, stuffing kindling into the bonfire structure, stringing Christmas lights, clearing pathways through the brush, stacking and nailing pallets, etc. Most of the work had been done before we arrived, but we were still there in time to pitch in and help out.
It was getting colder and colder, and having lost my voice 2 days before, I was not really enjoying having to deal with the cold. But in our prayers, there were no doubts that this was where we were supposed to be. That evening, with the temperature hitting 12 degrees F, I volunteered to stand out in the cold and direct the parking. No lights, just out on the plains of Canada, with cold snow all around, waiting for cars to come in, and if not, I might get eaten by wolves (not really – there are no wolves there). I did get cold. Fortunately I was up with all the layers I needed so I would not get chilled.
But lo and behold, as the cars came in, one of the cars drove up and it was the young farmer! The last member of our CUG team that could come was here! Once everyone was parked, we went in to the burn area, and lit the fire!
We had a lot of opportunities to talk with our team, re-connect, and meet new people. One conversation in particular stood out, and it was not something I expected. There was another missionary there, from a different organization, who had a similar story to ours. She had been working in Asia, preparing art materials for outreach for children, but over time for various reasons had to return home. Kind of like us having worked in the Philippines for many years, and then needing to come home and not being able to return. In our discussion, we shared how we both had gone through a deep spiritual struggle on having come home from the field, wondering what God’s plan was, and finally coming to a settled peace about His working on having us exactly in the place that he wants us. It was an encouraging conversation for both of us.
You often don’t know who God is going to put in your path and what the purpose for that will be.
So looking at God’s hand in this event, we had a joyous reunion with our team, opportunities to fellowship with other believers, and opportunities to be an encouragement to anyone that was open. It doesn’t always have to be the some amazing great thing. God often likes to work through us in more common, down to earth ways.
We finally went back to our lodging after ringing in the New Year. I had a difficult time sleeping on account of this cold and sore throat, being in the cold and talking all evening, but I managed to finally sleep.
On New Year’s Day we had some old friends, also from our time in Carlsbad, come over and visit with us. This was a fellow engineer that I worked with at Mosaic when we lived there, along with his wife. Their kids and our kids had played together. He grew up in this area of Manitoba, and his sister lives just 10 minutes from where we are staying. So it was another nice reunion with some old friends.
It got me thinking about the journey God has taken us through over the years. In 1998 when I got out of the Navy, I was expected to return to my home town, find work, perhaps with a local engineering firm, and re-connect with the community I grew up in. As much as I love the people I grew up with and as much as I love the community I grew up in, I knew at the time that we were not supposed to return home. We needed to do something else, and at the time I knew that missions was in the future, but I wasn’t ready to take the leap of faith just yet. The job opportunity came up for me to work in Carlsbad. At the time, it was almost an “are you crazy?” type of reaction from my beautiful wife (not the first time I’ve been asked that). She didn’t want to go to the desert, as she grew up in East Texas around lots of trees. Not only that, I had chosen the job offer in Carlsbad over a job offer at a chemical plant in East Texas.
Nevertheless, God had used that choice to put us on the path where we are today. Carlsbad had been the launching point for us to become missionaries. And here in Manitoba, we were able to re-connect with some of our friends that we had known when we were there. Who would have thought?
On our last day in Manitoba, we were able to have a team meeting to strategize for where this part of the ministry is going in the future. I have mentioned before that one of the reasons we are involved in researching Burning Man and the Age of Re-enchantment is because of its effect on risk in international missions, in particular on geopolitical trends and policy trends globally. At the same time, there are tremendous opportunities for evangelizing to this cultural group, and so we want to keep up with it and go deeper.
Some of the plans we came up with had to do with how to train (spiritually) for the event, and how to have the right mindset of outreach while there. So this can be a point of prayer for the future. We anticipate there will be more opportunities to meet together, and maybe attend other events, as we delve deeper into what is happening in this area, and pursuing to know what God’s desire is for how we are to engage with it.
So now we are looking forward. Even though 2025 looks like the international crisis is going to continue and maybe get worse, with 3 very significant conflict zones, we are filled with hope and anticipation on the things that God is doing. We are privileged to be a part of it!