I looked in vain during the pre-Christmas shopping madness for SOME voice suggesting an alternative to buying expensive gifts for people who don’t need them (or rushing out to the drugstore for a last-minute bottle of cheap perfume!).That alternative means you don’t cave to the retailers’ propaganda, but instead give the money to the charity/charities of your choice, and let your gift list know what you have done.  And suggest they do likewise next year.  I bet you’ll get heartfelt expressions of relief at getting off the gift merry-go-round.

In reality, there is no “War on Christmas.” This latest little media boomlet is yet and just another diversion by the Republican Right to distract middle and working class Americans from the economic effects of their kleptocracy, from the innocent dead of Louisiana and in the streets of Iraq. From the kids who’ll never walk again because Bush sent them to war for Armageddon and oil.

I was raised in the Baptist, Methodist, Lutheran, Catholic tradition by my Mother who was searching for something and made damn sure I was going to find it too. My Father, however, was probably an agnostic. He went to church one Christmas Eve because my Mother nagged him incessantly for a month. He never attended again. When I was older I asked him why he never attended Church. He said that if there was anything he could tell me that would give me insight into humans it was, “don’t pay any attention to what they say, only what they do.” He knew those people in Church. He saw how they lived their lives in complete contrast to what they said they believed. He called them what they were, hypocrites.

I am older than my father was at that time. I have watched the turmoil around the world all in the name of religion. I have known people who never miss a sermon or a mass who also say and do things that go against everything they say they hold dear and sacred. But they excuse their bad behavior by saying that they are “forgiven.”

Bertrand Russell pointed out that people join the religion that is prevalent in their area. I personally think it is worse than that. It is like child abuse, it is cyclic in nature. Parents take their children to bible classes where their heads get filled with biblic fairey tales. They want to please their parents so they accept as true everything they are told about their religion and they become brainwashed into accepting it as the gospel. It isn’t. The Greeks and Romans were just as devoted to their “God and Goddesess” as todays peoples are devoted to theirs. Yet, if any one were to say they worshipped Zeus, or Hecate, they would be laughed at. Those “belief” systems that are built during our childhood are very powerful and hard to over come.

I am cynical and always have been since I had my epiphany that religion is about control and big business. Stop and think about how much money is given to the religious institutions on any given day in this country. People will scream about income taxes from which they derive some good and yet they will fork over 10% of their weekly pay and get nothing. But they will also spend $1,500 a piece for wheels that spin after you stop and would be incensed if asked to spend that same amount on their child’s education.

Christmas, the way it is now celebrated, has become the Epitome of everything that is wrong with this society. Christ, whether you believe he was God on earth or just a good and wise man, he just stood on the side of Life’s road and pointed out the way to have a better world. Unscrupulous humans then took control and turned it into big business.

The only religion that has ever impressed me is Buddhaism. When I was serving in Viet Nam I saw a Buddhist Monk set himself on fire to protest the treatment of his fellow monks and the people of his country by a corrupt government that we were supporting. And over the years more than one monk sacrificed himself.They did what Christ is purported to have done, gave up their own life for something they thought was worth sacrificing it for. They didn’t blow themselves up and take others who weren’t part of the problem with them as do the religious fanatics of todays world. Personally, if it were up to me I would just put a stop to all religions. It keeps most of the world in a state of barely controlled barbarism and when I hear these whiny, self righteous Christians complaining about “someone” denying them their right to have God on the money, in the Pledge of Allegiance, to pray at public events or in school, to teach their religion as science or to use the word “Christmas,” my response is, if your faith in what you believe is so dependent upon everyone who doesn’t believe what you believe having it thrown in our faces, then your faith is not very strong.

So, to everyone who reads this, have a Merry Christmas, Happy Holiday, Celebrate the Winter Solstice, Happy Hannuka, Krazy Kwanza, Joyeuex Noel, may you have good health, Love, Peace, and Intellectual Honesty in the coming year and throughout your life.

Hi all, I’m from England, and very much an atheist. Although I hate being preached to, and told how good and great god (any of them) is, I am not offended by the WORD Christmas. The English language is awash with references to history/religion e.g. the months after Greek gods. I personaly coulden’t give a rats arse how people great me during the holiday period, as long as I’m not told/asked to pay hommage to some jewish bloke who died a while back. I think it’s on a par with being offended by cursing, its only offensive if you take offence.

Christmas is a specific religious event based upon the birth of jesus, a specific christian religion event.  it has become a central holiday period for most western countries and this if for a variety of reasons, most of which are not religious.  for others to take a vacation and buy some stuff during someone else’s holy event is hardly disrespectful.  what did you do during ramadan?  if you are not christian but still live in a western culture you are free to do as you wish in regards to the event.  most go along with the majority.
however, this does point to a significant evil of religion: the fact that different supernatural beliefs are held dogmatically mean inevitable conflict with other supernatural beliefs, also held dogmatically.  as george carlin says “ our god had a bigger dick than your god!”
so long a people continue to hold supernatural belief dogmatically, it is impossible to know the truth and so conflict will arise.  that is the history of much of the human race…

Jesus, the Prince of Peace, said, “In my Father’s house, there are many mansions.” This, combined with the story of the good Samaritan, indicates to me that Jesus meant for us to respect those who worship in houses other than the one of our own religious preference.  I think Christian holidays should be celebrated as Christian holidays--in a society which similarly celebrates, respects, and enjoys the the religious holidays of other faiths.

It isn’t necessary to take Christ out of Christmas in order to be fair to everyone: it’s finer for all of us if the holidays of people of all religions are announced so we can all share in them, or at least be respectfully aware of them, and take the time to learn about all those other mansions in his Father’s house.

We need more celebrations, not fewer, and certainly not all these arguments about whose get noticed.  I think Jesus would have been happy to attend every family’s holiday celebrations. He told us to love one another; so let’s stop the bickering and enjoy his birthday.

Christmas in the U.S.A. has definitely morphed into a paradoxical event. I believe this will only excaberated by continued attempts to forge a deeper link between the merchandising/purchasing/gifting experience and the religious observances praising birth of the Christ.

While sitting in church today, I noted the sanctuary was decorated with manger scene sets for this evening’s children’s program. Over to the left was a decorated fir tree with wrapped gifts beneath it.

It dawned on me that Christians in the wealthiest country on earth could perhaps recognize the birth of Christ better by giving gifts to the citizens of the poorest countries, rather than by exchanging gifts with other citizens of this wealthy country.

A little history - Christmas was fixed near the winter solstice, to give early Christians the ability to celebrate a holiday near a pagan holiday called natalis invicti solis, or the birth of the unconquered sun.  That Jesus was not born on December 25th is absolutely certain. So the date and reason for having it are tangential to Christianity.

Now, the holy season of Advent in the early church calendar is where Christians are to reflect about why God took human form to walk among us.  That is a worthwhile and noble thing to reflect on.  However, the date, the trappings and the way it is currently celebrated, are in many ways, at odds with the ideas of Advent.

Of course, Bill O’Reilly and his ilk don’t have the slightest idea about what it means to be a Christian, so all this sound and fury have nothing to do with Christ or the “true” meaning of Advent.  They are the antithesis of Christianity.

We’re trapped it seems.  Too bad we can’t find another day for gift giving, but our economic survival depends on how much people spend this time of the year.  Christmas should be more like Thanksgiving, it should be a quiet time for Christians to celebrate Christ’s birth, instead this holy day has got sucked up into a season of parties, gift buying and other forms of merry making that is often more of chore than a joy.

Christmas is about Christ, shopping is about the Holidays, the two have become one, impossible to separate them.  By the way, Holiday means Holy Day, so either way we wish each other a Happy Holy Season.

peace
Mitch

I am an agnostic but I have a great deal more respect for Jesus and his teachings than do most of the Christians I know and read about. The more Bush and his reign of terror prevails, the more I will look elsewhere for the significance of life.

The “Christian” church has become so materialistic and self-centered that I have stayed away from church for the last 2 years.  About 3 1/2 years ago, a church I attended that my mother helped start in our community with the Presbyterian church, was closed because there were not enough members to support it.  My mother who was a devout Christian for most of her life was deeply disappointed, although she accepted it.  I was bitterly critical of the Synod that decided to close this church.  One of the members of this church who was from an African country said, “if this was a church started in Africa, they would not think of closing it because not enough money was raised.” I, finally, realized that the church is a business and if it does not make a profit, then it needs to be closed.  I have been pretty discouraged with this idea and also a lot of the petty intolerance of church leaders and the hate that is rampant among them.  My mother died soon after they closed the church and after she died I tried to find a new church, but did not like what I saw and heard, so I stopped going.  I pray to the Lord God in my own way and pray that He would open the hearts of this nation and the “leaders of the church” who are so full of hate and intolerance.