Really great. Bravo!
And thanks.

Diane,

I like to think of myself as a mainstream progressive thinker, yet I am continuously alienated by your posts that seem to imply all liberal and progressive thinkers should be sharing the exact same viewpoints you preach. One particular clause in this post stands out: “The idea that American Christians--who own the White House, Congress, the FCC, and the so-called War on Terror…” Are you stating that all American Christians are inherently in support of the current administration and its policies by the simple virtue of a shared religious belief? I certainly hope you recognize that one can be a liberal and still be a Christian. In fact, even though Christian philosophy is not specifically left or right, I find it more fitting to be a left-leaning Christian, considering the concepts of tolerance and mutual welfare preached by the religion.

Your argument that Christmas is justifiably secularized since the date was originally used to celebrate the solstice is oft repeated and faulty at best. Historians and theologists may well agree that Jesus was not born December 25, but that does not change the fact that Christians worldwide have used the date for over a thousand years to celebrate is birth and what it means for them. Historians also agree that the Thanksgiving feasts of the Pilgrims likely happened in September or early October, but it doesn’t invalidate the holiday that we choose to celebrate it in November.

I agree that fundamentalists such as O’Reilly, Gibson, and Falwell have gone to ridiculous extremes in waging their “War on the War on Christmas.” And I agree that we should continue to promote the separation of church and state and keep Bible scenes and the like off public and state property. However, I am against the dismissal of the simple word “Christmas” from the season, as if the sensibilities of non-Christians would be offended by the mere uttering of the word. Numerous holidays of different religions are celebrated this time of year, and all should be welcome in society, along with their greetings. Dismissing the beliefs of the majority to placate the minority makes no sense in a liberal society, where everyone is invited to celebrate and promote their beliefs.

Wishing you a Merry Christmas in secular appreciation of your own beliefs,

Hmm... You mention Kwanzaa, but not Festivus. How is it that one entirely fictional, made-up celebration is elevated to this status, and yet, not another.

Only 1.6% of Americans celebrate Kwanzaa, yet you seem to place it in the same level as Christmas or Hannukah. Around 3% of Americans are going to celebrate Festivus.

There are way too many celebrations for the government to support any of them. The only celebrations that the government should celebrate are "nation"al holidays, like thanksgiving, veterans day, presidents day and the like.

Mike

Chris, if you re-read my post, you will see that I go out of my way at the beginning to say that I am talking about "certain Christians," not ALL Christians. By the time I get to the end of the post, I assume, perhaps incorrectly, that readers understand the context of "certain Christians," as characterized by the right wing. I probably should have repeated my definition.

I also make it clear in my post that I personally have no particular problem with the harmless tokens of the season--that my problem occurs when the overtly religious aspect of Christmas is forced upon the public, such as presenting Bible stories in public schools.

Finally, I stand by my argument that Christmas could be justifiably secularized because of its origins. This is not to say that I think it SHOULD be--I was just making the point that an O'Reilly or a Gibson want to go all technical about the subject, he could find himself with valid opposition.

Mike, I do mention Festivus. And by saying that Kwaanza should be acknowledged, my intention wasn't to give it the status of Christmas.

Two things:
1) The points about the historical background of Christmas, like any other holiday, can basically be used to say, "It wasn't always done this way." Current practice has a lot of social force, in which historical complexity tends to get brushed aside. This can be used to counter arguments in favor of preserving the so-called "purity" of a certain practice--it was never "purely" one thing to begin with.

2) The point about artifically elevating a certain holiday to the level of another should not be overdone, but there is something to it. In my mind, it is important to teach children and adults about other people's practices, while simultaneously not overdoing it on the analogies--"Hannukkah is kind of like Christmas", for example, is a simplistic statement that has been made more true recently, but historically could not be further from the truth. The events they comemorate and the celebrations, until fairly recently, had nothing to do with each other.

Don't get bogged down by this. It is merely a feint to draw your attention away from real issues like Iraq, Plamegate, Global warming, etc. That being said... As a card-carrying fringe element, I declare my whole-hearted support for the war on Christmas. Let's call it what it is: The Q4 Frenzied Consumer Festival of Lights. Get the religion out of my short-sighted, globally irresponsible, mouth-foaming spending spree! Christmas truly is for suckers and that's what Bill O'Reilly and his ilk want to preserve.

Put Christ back into Christmas? I have a better idea. Why not put Christ back into Christianity? The new Megachristianity has totally divested itself of the historically accepted teachings of Christ. "Compassion", we don't really do that anymore; "Thou shalt not kill", we certainly don't practice that. In fact we love to kil. We live to kill, you know, Arabs, Homosexuals, Liberals, Atheists, Africans, Asians, Hispanics etc.; "Heal the sick", well hell just send them to Kaiser after we take away their Medicare; "Help the Poor", No way. That's God's judgement against them. If they were right with God and all then they wouldn't be poor!; "Love thine enemy" That's a myth. All our enemies are of Satan, so we can hate them as much as we want.
As a matter of fact, let's just all forget about that skinny little bearded guy. No one really knows if he existed anyway. Now Paul we can understand.

This is just some agitprop to distract away from the quagmire, the deficit, the scandals, the incompetence, the...(fill in blank here). Who cares?

Re-direct to the issues.

Best,

D

What a friend we have in Jesus!

By Lee Salisbury

Help, Help, Help, dear Jesus! Those nasty secular liberal humanists are making war on Christmas. Jesus, please intercede, or if you are too busy then ask Mary if she can get your Daddy to do something quickly. Fox News, Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, John Gibson, not to mention James Dobson, and Jerry Falwell all report Christmas is under assault.

Those secularists control the newspapers, radio, TV, our government, and our universities. When I go to the Christian Wal-Mart store to get my household supplies, even the clerk will only say Happy Holiday instead of Merry Christmas. We need legislators to pass a Constitutional amendment requiring everybody to say “Merry Christmas,” otherwise people might say “Happy Hanukkah” or “Happy Kwanzaa.” America has become so accommodating in its multiculturalism that Christians can’t even tell those who don’t believe in Jesus that they are going to Hell.

This war against Christmas has caught Christians by surprise. Thank the Lord for John Gibson of FOX News. His new book, “The War On Christmas: How The Liberals Plot To Ban The Sacred Christmas Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought” exposes the liberal Democrats’ anti-God strategies. What a coincidence that Gibson’s book should come out just in time for Christmas! Gibson’s foreknowledge of this liberal satanic plot must reflect God’s omniscience rather than a planned scheme of right-wing ideologues.

Thankfully, Jerry Falwell of Liberty University and James Dobson of Focus on the Family each are reported to have over 800 attorneys scouring the countryside looking to sue those who would hinder the use of the sacred name “Christmas.” I pray that God give them a special dispensation so that they can ignore Jesus’ teaching on being reconciled with your opponents (Mt 5: 21-26).

Moreover, certainly Jesus did not mean what He said about “if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also” (Mt 5:40). That could only apply to non-believers.

Of course Christians should never have to forgive others, especially seventy times seven (Mt 18:21-22) unless it is the Christians who have done wrong and need forgiveness from each other.

“Christians must demand an apology when insulted” declared Catholic League for Religion and Civil Rights President Bill Donohue. Christians should sue for damages whenever they have their feelings hurt. Though Jesus said, “Blessed are you when people insult you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me, rejoice and be glad” (Mt 5:11-12), one cannot be bothered with technicalities. With all the different bibles available, there must be different translation.

It is a good thing courageous leaders like Falwell and Dobson have the foresight to manufacture threats of war. Fear mongering is a proven strategy. Karl Rove and Dick Cheney have proven that fear motivates, especially amongst Christians. After all, it was fear of Hell and the need for fire insurance that corralled them in the first place. Fear works every time.

The Taliban fundamentalists set a good example for Christians. To hell with the outdated Christmas message of “peace on earth, good will toward men.” If people don’t measure up to ‘our true’ Christian standards, than either put them in jail or shoot them. Christians must get respect, whatever way necessary. As President Bush said, “either you’re for us or against us.”

Christmas can never be too worldly! Now that corporate America and fundamentalist Christianity have merged under the GOP banner, they can proudly demand the same grandstanding privileges. Jesus called it “practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them…sound a trumpet… when you pray…stand on the street corners so you may be seen of men” (Mt 6:1– 7). Make sure everyone knows how religious we are, cause only religious people are moral. Than all the ungrateful reprobates will repent and be good disciples like us.

The coup d’etat is almost complete. Corporate America, the FOX like media, and the fundamentalist owned GOP have seduced religious-minded America. What better way to excite gullible Christians, amass more offerings, and generate corporate earnings than a fabricated war on Christmas? At the next FOX board meeting after Christmas, O’Reilly, Gibson, and Hannity can join CEO Rupert Murdoch and their GOP legislative lackeys in singing, “What a friend we have in Jesus”.

Jesus’ virgin birth story is remarkably similar to pagan savior-god stories

God’s solution to the “Merry Christmas” dilemma

By Lee Salisbury

There was a 14-year time-span in my life when I was a fervent bible-believing preacher. Saying “Merry Christmas” would have been my only greeting because Christmas was Jesus’ birthday. It never occurred to me to respect people of other faiths or no faith.

I remember when some thoughtful (and frankly better educated) people presented me with historical facts that 2,000 years ago there were many savior-gods, whose stories were remarkably similar to Jesus’ story. Those other savior-gods were even born of virgin mothers such as the Egyptian Horus, the Persian/Roman Mithra, or the Greek Adonis. I remember my reaction, “This sounds like blasphemy.”

Of course, we all knew “blasphemy” is dangerous. Thinking such blasphemous thoughts might lead one to lose salvation. One of the negative fruits of monotheism is people are consistently told, “If you don’t believe the way I believe, you’re going to hell.” The implication is “I’m one of the few truly obedient to God and you’re a no-good sinner.” Just being a follower of the likes of the Pope or Jerry Falwell or Joseph Smith or Charles Taze Russell, etc., etc., perpetuates this sick holier-than-thou mantra.

Today, I am often asked, “How did you escape from fundamentalism?” That question really reveals the fear mentality, inherent within fundamentalism and enslaves its adherents. In retrospect, I do wonder, what could be more debilitating than a mind-set that claims to know the absolute truth about things for which there is virtually no verifiable evidence, no unbiased credible historical confirmation, and is so contrary to the natural order of everyday life.

A vital doctrine of fundamentalism is the Christmas story of Jesus’ being born of a virgin. This doctrine is standard orthodox, “must believe” truth by Catholic and Protestant fundamentalists of every stripe. How can you tell? Just try to join a church without belief in this doctrine! I doubt that even the apostle Paul could join any of today’s fundamentalist churches.

Paul, whose epistles preceded the gospels, does not ever mention the virgin birth. If Paul had known of a virgin birth of Jesus, he surely would have mentioned it at least once. In fact, the opposite is true. In about 55-60 CE, Paul recorded the first known reference to Jesus' birth. "But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law"(Gal.4:4). If Paul had believed in a virgin birth, he would have said "virgin" not “woman”. According to Paul, Jesus’ birth was natural with no supernatural intervention.
"I Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle and separated onto the gospel of God...concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh (Rom 1:1-3). The phrase "of the seed of David" strongly indicates that Paul believed Joseph was Jesus’ natural father. The phrase "according to the flesh" implies a natural conception and birth. A divine interjection prohibits Jesus' royal lineage of King David through Joseph.
Some Christian apologists speculate that the Jews of Paul’s day could not write about a virgin born Messiah because of its similarity with Greek-Babylonian savior-gods. If that explanation were valid, than the pagan practice of baptism and eucharist would also have been rejected. They were not. Further, the Jewish bible has no prophesy predicting a Messiah born of a virgin.
Mark’s gospel written next after Paul’s epistle does not mention the virgin birth. The virgin birth first appears in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew circa 80 to 90 CE when most converts were gentiles from pagan religions. Jesus’ birth story had to at least equal the supernatural element in pagan savior-god stories. Thus, Jesus’ virgin birth account, like the Trinity doctrine, was contrived by 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Century Roman theologians.
The Jesus story is not unique. Among the many mythical pagan Gods, Hercules, Osiris, Bacchus, Mithra, Hermes, Prometheus, Perseus and Horus, all had God as their father, had a virgin mother, had births announced by a heavenly confirmation and music, were born about December 25th, had an attempt on their life by a tyrant, and met a violent death followed by resurrection.
Thankfully, God has given me the infallible revelation solving the War on Christmas controversy about whether to say “Merry Christmas. Contrary to most fundamentalists, God is too loving to be intolerant of other lesser savior-gods and their respective worshippers. Since it is an indisputable speculative fact that all savior-gods have nine-month incubation periods, God says we will all be theologically correct by greeting each other every March 25th with “Merry Conception!”

I used to be a christian, but I find religions to be very devisive and intollerant. This is goes against the grain of all religious doctrine. Love your neighbors, find goodness in your enemies should be practiced worldwide by all religions. Currently, most religious leaders (particularly fundamentalist christians), with the exception of the Dalai Lama, are small men who feel self important and use their power to divide and conquer. In other words, they are evil. I do not see how any intelligent, critically thinking adult could follow any of the current western christian leaders (nor any other "fundamentalist" religious leader.

The original teachings of all religions speak of love and forgiveness. The current religious leaders do not teach this and support war.

What would Jesus do?

I enjoyed your article and posted it on a bulletin board here where I work. (The bulletin board is a posting place for articles about current events and hot topics.) If people want to put up nativity sets and sing religious songs in church, in church-run schools, at church-run events, or in their private homes, that's their business and none of my own. But if people want such displays government-endorsed in public schools and public places, I think they need to re-aquaint themselves with the uniquely American rule that governmental sponsorship of one spiritual tradition is prohibited. I think this country is big enough and its people are flexible enough to allow for the holy and the secular to both do their rituals and routines in peace.

In King County, WA, the county executive sent out an email to county employees a few years ago telling county employees *not* to wish coworkers a Merry Christmas. After he was ridiculed in the national press, he rescinded the email. Of course the media is blowing this out of proportion. They blow everything out of proportion. That's what they do. This is tangential to the fact that if a county executive feels the need to tell people NOT to wish each other Merry Christmas in the workplace, that there is an absurd oversensitivity and a problem here, amidst all the hype and rhetoric

Annot a fascist. Wish them a hearty "Happy Holidays". I was raised in a Christian family (They still love me) in a community that was 99% Christian and never once did I hear anyone complain about the phrase "Happy Holidays". It was always short for "Merry Christmas and Happy New Year".

I for one am sick of this bickering,whining and complaining going on.Why do we have to go in to depth of what Christmas is all about, my thinking is its about my kids getting gifts in the morning and not some right wing idiot telling me I'm in wrong because I don't follow his ideaology.What would Jesus do if he saw them shoving all there ideas down our throats? I know because Jesus doesn't work that way!

I thought the phrase "Happy Holidays" INCLUDED Christmas.