Since Thanksgiving, I've received so many emails and seen so many Facebook posts about "Merry Christmas". I know, it's the holiday season, and it's really nice to have all the cheer of friends and family alike. I love this time of year. Snow, the smell of fresh evergreen in the living room from a beautiful tree, buying stuff for my boys, having friends over for holiday cheer, celebrating another year, looking forward to the upcoming year, the lights that all the neighbors put up (I'm seriously too lazy, but I do love the way the look at night). It's just "the most wonderful time of the year". Christmas isn't just about "Christians". It's about family and friends. The end of a year and the beginning of a new one. The hopes that never came to fruition overridden by the hopes that are only beginning. Almost all people even seem to be nicer this time of the year. They tend to remember to say excuse me in a polite way, rather than not at all or with sarcasm, as they try to get by in the Walmart, the grocery stores, heck, even in the mall. It's wonderful and beautiful--nice people with a backdrop of the bright reds and greens and white imitating fresh snow. We hear the bells of the Salvation Army ringing and see the trees and trimmings, and we can't help but be caught up in the spirit. The teddy bears, the elves, the poinsettas, the smell of candy canes, and apple spice. The smells, the lights, the beauty of it all radiates through the air and permeates almost the biggest of scrooges. Like any other feeling, happiness and good spirit can take over a crowd. It's the mob mentality without the mob.
So why do so many people send out emails or post stuff that demand others refer to it as Merry Christmas? They don't want to hear "Happy Holidays" or "Happy Kwanzaa" or even "Happy Hanukkah". It's Christmas for crying out loud. Well, ok, it's Christmas for you. It's Christmas for a lot of us. I still call it Christmas. I still celebrate "Christmas" the way I grew up. Tree, trimmings, holiday lights, food, egg nog, Santa Claus, stockings hanging on the fireplace, but honestly I don't see what any of those things have to do with "Christmas" if we are talking about the birth of Christ--which by the way is what Christians are actually supposed to be celebrating. There's nothing wrong with Christians celebrating the birth of Christ. I think it's pretty cute when I see someone that has put a lot of work and energy into a little manger set up with donkeys and camels and three wise men. It's all very touching when we think about the concept of all of these figures of the long gone past coming together for the birth of a child. It's softening to the soul the hope that Christ represented for the Christian people of years gone by. Christ taught tolerance and equality, do unto others as you would have done onto you. Yet, I find it disheartening that it seems like some would disconnect themselves from the spirit of Christ's teachings as they celebrate his birth. The father, the son and the holy spirit. Would not the father of all be far more forgiving than arguing over "Merry Christmas" versus "Happy Holidays"? Did not the son teach this? Would the holiest of spirits not want us to be good to each other regardless of our own personal beliefs? Do we truly believe that Christ meant for us to condemn others simply because they don't share our religious beliefs? I find it very unlikely.
The argument is often made that Christ and the Bible teach that we are damned if we don't accept Jesus Christ as our savior. My aunt was a Sunday School teacher. I've read the entire Bible, all 3 accepted versions of it. I don't remember it saying specifically we're damned if we don't accept Christ as our savior. I do remember people making the argument that is how it is to be interpreted. The word "damn" wasn't even a word during "biblical" times. So, I think the assumption that is what the Bible means might be a stretch. I also have heard all the arguments that we are supposed to spread the "good word". Yes, I do remember those stanzas. It didn't say anything about using intimidation, force, demand or by demeaning others. In fact, his teachings were quite the opposite. So when I recieve these demands to say "Merry Christmas", it does cause me to scratch my head a little and wonder if anyone has actually read their Bibles lately. I'm not sure that the Bible should be taken so literally either--I'm not buying that God's one day is equal to one of ours. There are planets where one day there is 1/10th of a day here. Likewise, there are planets that one day there is a year here on good old planet earth. God's seven days might be several of our lifetimes. We might be like bugs that live only a single season to God. If the literal interpretations are not accurate, then I'm not sure that God chose only "one" son or prophet to guide or save us either.
The Westboro Church condemns even other Christians because they might be gay or soldiers. Almost everyone agrees that they are a bit nauseating. It's so rude of them to tell others that they cannot happily celebrate a marriage or a miltary homecoming. It's rude for them to tell others that they are damned and they don't care about if they are human beings that possibly God, for whatever reason, made gay or lesbian. They don't care if a family is just happy to be together after a long time apart. While they are far more famous for their rhetoric at sadder times, they don't respect other people and the mass majority of us are completely mortified by it. I know so many that are mortified by their behavior. Yet, these same people, so nauseated by Westboro are often the ones screaming at the top of their lungs that the United States is a Christian country, founded in Christ, and shooting emails around about how "it's not Happy Holidays, it's "Merry CHRISTMAS!!! You dumb mother-f***er."
I believe that Christ tried to guide us to a more tolerant and accepting society. Yet, often the people that attend churches every Sunday, professing their love of "God's word" are are the most crass, judgemental, phony, backstabbing, prejudice, selfish, and/or debase human beings claiming they know exactly what "God's word" is. Even if we truly believe Christ is the only way, how does bullying people with another belief actually make that point? It's contridictory to Christ's teachings of tolerance and peace.
"The season is the reason," my Grams used to say. We say the "season" for a reason. The truth is Christ was born in the spring. We celebrate around the end of December because Winter begins, the Winter solstace, and so many religions have their celebrations around this time of year--not just Christians. The desire of each of those celebrations is to focus on peace, good will, family, friends and the many gifts that we have. If the season is the reason, and Christians have chosen this time of the year to celebrate the birth of Christ, then perhaps it is because of its commonality with the other religions that Christmas is in December and not in March. Perhaps, "Happy Holidays" truly is more important, not one religion over another, not one person over another, but in celebration of so much more, because "the Season is the Reason." It's the Season that all of us can agree on one thing we want more than anything---Peace on Earth.
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