Merry Christmas — Or Else
Like I said, Christmas arrived today, unabated. That being so, it’s given me pause to think about the alleged “War on Christmas.”
Now, it seems to me that the birth of Jesus is the foundation of all this uproar, and He had quite a bit to say about peace, loving one’s neighbor, and looking out for the less fortunate. So, it’s confusing to me why these Christmas Warriors (like Falwell, Robertson and O’Reilly, etc.) get so all exercised about whether or not employees at Wal-Mart say “Happy Holidays” rather than “Merry Christmas.”
Modern Christmas involves a great deal of buying and selling, as Scrooge observed to the Ghost of Christmas Present. The Good Christianstm noted above moan about how commercialized Christmas has become.
However, it seems that there is good money to be had defending Christmas from the secular liberals who (allegedly) want to destroy the holiday. It has created quite a jackpot for those who want everyone to share their religion with us whether we want to or not.
If they want to demonstrate how wonderful their religion is and spread Jesus’ philosophy of goodwill towards all, you’d think the Fundies would be all over charitable works rather than worrying about whether or not the Temples of Conspicuous Consumption put banners reading “Merry Christmas!” in their adverts for their latest 50% Off Sale.
Do you suppose it’s a case of “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”?
December 25th, 2006 at 11:20pm
There is a very fundamentalist Baptist church a half block from my house. They had a smaller crowd for their Christmas eve service than a normal Sunday, and had no Christmas display up. When Christmas fell on a Sunday last year, almost no one showed up, and they don’t have a midnight service.
If they aren’t going to take the religious significance of Christmas seriously, why should anyone else?
I would note that almost every President that has made radio broadcasts has ended their last radio broadcast prior to Christmas with a reference to “Peace on Earth to Men of Goodwill,” so why didn’t this President who is supposed to be such a staunch Christian?
This is about marketing, not morality.