Thoughts on Christmas

I hadn't planned on blogging about this again, but a couple of interesting articles got me thinking about it some more. The "battle" over Christmas continues, but what exactly is it that these concerned Christians are fighting for? Adam Cohen at the New York Times thinks they're fighting for a holiday their ancestors would've regarded as most un-Christian.

What is less obvious, though, is that Christmas's self-proclaimed
defenders are rewriting the holiday's history. They claim that the "traditional" American Christmas is under attack by what John Gibson, another Fox anchor, calls "professional atheists" and "Christian haters." But America has a complicated history with Christmas, going back to the Puritans, who despised it. What the boycotters are doing is not defending America's Christmas traditions, but creating a new version of the holiday that fits a political agenda.

He follows this with a short history of the holiday in our country, including fears over it's ever-increasing commercialzation. So what exactly are these concerned Christians fighting for?

The Christmas that Mr. O'Reilly and his allies are promoting - one
closely aligned with retailers, with a smack-down attitude toward nonobservers - fits with their campaign to make America more like a theocracy, with Christian displays on public property and Christian prayer in public schools.

He does say this trend doesn't appear to be catching on, and I agree. It really doesn't help that the conservative leaders most concerned with this are the likes of John Gibson and Bill O'Reilly at Fox News, and "extreme" Christian leaders Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell.

Colbert King at the Washington Post notes this nexus of the Christmas battle and commercialization too:

Silly me! And here I've been thinking that Target, Home Depot,
Wal-Mart, Kmart and America's malls are places where people go this time of year to shop. But thanks to the Rev. Jerry Falwell and others in his wing of Christendom, I now know that those stores are there during the holiday season to serve as places of worship. What other conclusion can be drawn?

Falwell, as he desires his flock to know, wants Americans to do their shopping at stores that greet you with "Merry Christmas" and that celebrate the birthday of Jesus in carols, religious decorations and marketing displays. In my old neighborhood, that used to be called "church."

As you may or may not know, I'm something of an atheist. Despite that fact, I love Christmas. It's absolutely my favorite time of year. And despite the fact that I'm generally suspicious of religious mumbo-jumbo, there is nonetheless something awe-inspiring about the story of the birth of Christ. And there are plenty of people like myself who hate the rampant commercialization of Christmas. Cohen mentions how this was a concern to Christians leaders as far back as early last century:

By the 1920's, the retail industry had adopted Christmas as its own, sponsoring annual ceremonies to kick off the "Christmas shopping season."Religious leaders objected strongly. The Christmas that emerged had an inherent tension: merchants tried to make it about buying, while clergymen tried to keep commerce out. A 1931 Times roundup of Christmas sermons reported a common theme: "the suggestion that Christmas could not survive if Christ were thrust into the background by materialism." A 1953 Methodist sermon broadcast on NBC - typical of countless such sermons - lamented that Christmas had become a "profit-seeking period." This ethic found popular expression in "A Charlie Brown Christmas." In the 1965 TV special, Charlie Brown ignores Lucy's advice to "get the biggest aluminum tree you can find" and her assertion that Christmas is "a big commercial racket," and finds a more spiritual way to observe the day.

Seems to me their fears were justified. I try not to be too bah-humbug about it, but the litany of commercials encouraging people to go out and spend spend spend starting the day after Thanksgiving is wearying. Whether you are religiously inclined or not, such a message dilutes any true "meaning" of Christmas. Honestly, I'd be okay if somebody put a spending cap on Christmas (and I mean a low one) or every other year or so we swore off gift-giving at all. And yet those battling for Christmas aren't concerned with commercialization; they embrace it. Whether they know it or not, they seem willing to sacrifice the sacred meaning of Christmas to score political points against liberals. And they seem willing to accept the unique phenomenon in our hyper-capitalist society, which embraces every opportunity to turn a sacred day into a day for a sale. It's too bad really, because fighting for a the real spirit of Christmas is something that I think both liberals and conservatives, Christian and non-Christian, could get behind.