I love all sorts of music, and I listen to lots of songs based on different belief systems. Even if I don’t agree with the lyrics, I can still appreciate the music and the “atmosphere” the band is trying to create.
I like Christmas music, but I’m not a Christian. I also like Black Metal, but I’m not a Satanist. I like a lot of political punk, but I’m not an anarchist etc. etc.
I think many of us probably do this. How many people who listen to Country and Western are actually cowboys?
Me. Well actually, I’m a Jewish cowboy. My name’s Bucky Goldstein.
I feel the same way. Christmas was the only thing I enjoyed about the decade or so I actually identified as Christian - I still celebrate it and am fond of all the American trappings.
I’m a serious atheist who enjoys Christmas music, and so is Richard Dawkins. I think he’s pretty much the standard for militant atheist, so if <i>he</i> thinks it’s ok… 
That said, it might well bother me if I lived in a country where I felt smothered by Christianity or otherwise didn’t want to celebrate Christmas, I’d definitely feel it pressed onto me. Or if I was simply annoyed by how pervasive christmas music was.
I think it’s that many people are used to taking (for instance) oaths and prayers seriously, so have a serious problem if they take an oath affirming something they don’t believe in, because it’s disrespectful to both them, and to what they’re falsely affirming. Whereas people <i>all the time</i> enjoy music they think is nice, whether they agree with all the lyrics or not (and also, say, are in the presence of other people saying things they don’t agree with), so don’t think they mean anything by it.
There was a a quote in The Sparrow, where a Jewish character said they had absolutely nothing to say against Handel’s Messiah: they thought it was an incredible celebration, and the only potential caveat was being a tad premature off the mark
Hey I like music by some atheists that are expressely so (ie “Imagine”)
Betting the US treasury that Der Trihs will come over here and rambling about how listening to Christian music is equivalent to listening to and enjoying Nazi music such as Prussian Blue.
Atheist who likes classic Christmas songs. Angels We Have Heard On High, Carol of the Bells, What Child Is This…
Aside from my annual blasting of Twisted Christmas for my co-workers, I don’t really enjoy “Santa Claus” songs.
Yeah, that’s pretty much been this atheist/lifelong heathen’s personal take on it, too. The songs might as well be about Thor, or Anubis, or King Arthur. And like Sattua says, I appreciate the beauty and the sentiment, without the need for the gods themselves.
Hey, christianity has appropriated plenty of stuff for it’s own holiday traditions, over the centuries of development. I’m just returning the favor. 
Atheist here - it’s the overplay that gets me, then the quality of the piece and its arrangement. The religion doesn’t bug me much at all, and as many others have said upthread, much of the Mediaeval, Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic and Contemporary music is based on religious texts.
BTW, I wanted to pop in and thank all the atheists who contributed answers - the fact that pretty much all of you said the same thing helped too. I guess the best analogy (for me) is the one I made in the OP about how I listen to, enjoy, and sing national anthems without prescribing to any of the beliefs therein contained in the anthem.
Ignorance* fought.
*(not really “ignorance” per se as I didn’t have a single presupposition coming in)
Another Xmas-loving atheist here. Not only do I love (and sing) the music, but this will be my fourth year putting up a tree.
IANAA, but the overplay gets me too… and I think Raphael should be hung by his own guts on two counts: one of spelling his name with that “ph” despite being from Spain, and one of his recording of The Little Drummer Boy. Sends me up three walls and down five more from the first “oh how I love listening to myself sing” note.
When I was a teen (1980s), there was a program in the local radio station whose DJ would frequently get suspended on account of such egregious offenses as “celebrating Elvis’ birthday” or “playing a demo tape he’d liked.” I remember he once had a “Christmas special” in July, because he’d caught himself humming a Christmas carol “and what the heck, when it’s 40C outside, thoughts of snow might help us stay cool!” I don’t remember whether he did get suspended for that one, though…
Other than the concerts on Christmas day, or specials a couple hours long, I don’t think I’ve ever heard Christmas-based programming on Spanish radio stations, though. In stores, yes; on the radio, hell no. I refuse to shop at stores playing carols on account of them always picking the most saccharine versions they can find.
I was an atheist in my youth, and my objection to Christmas music then is the same as it is today. It’s not the content that is objectionable, but the fact that so much Christmas music is so lame. And so grossly overplayed.
There is excellent Christmas music out there. You won’t hear any of it in the malls. Or the radio.
(Mod hat on)
Please refrain from potshots at other posters. This forum is not thr place for it.
We sing that one every year when we go caroling - I may be a Jewish agnostic, but I’m also a huge choir geek, and my HS choir buddies and I (and now, many of their kids) go caroling pretty much every year. I don’t mind Christmas songs as an entire category, but as with 95% of music generally, many renditions of them are crap. Throw in the overplaying, and I’m glad when Christmas is over, even though it’s the one time of the year when the local classical station does All Choral Music, All the Time, which I love.
The funniest caroling episode was a couple of years ago - the usual crew had decided to ring one more doorbell before heading inside for the evening, and so we picked a likely suspect: a huge house with a grand front porch, decorated with a large evergreen tree covered in lights. We rang the doorbell and launched into a rousing chorus of “Good King Wenceslas,” or something equally Jesusy.
The man who opened the door had a rather Grinch-like expression on his face, and when we finished and asked whether he had any requests, we were treated to a rant about how could we possibly think he was a Christian and would appreciate that sort of thing? Because, you know, the Christians co-opted the Yule log from the Druids! It was about all we could do to refrain from cracking up on the guy’s front doorstep.
You forgot “God Damn the Pusher Man” - Steppenwolf
Small a atheist (ie not antitheist) and I enjoy all music about imaginary people, Christmas or not.
Another fan here* – with the usual caveats regarding over-play and the lameness of some of them.
Enjoy the trad carols (O Come All Ye Faithful, Silent Night, etc), as well as many of the popular non-carol songs (I have a particular fondness for Snoopy’s Christmas)… and am even prepared to reveal that The Little Drummer Boy may actually be my all-time favourite. 
Some of the very non-trad songs are fun too – I have an album of Christmas music called The Bells of Dublin – Irish group The Chieftains plus guest artists performing some trad and some very-not-trad songs. Some highlights include: Elvis Costello with the St. Stephen’s Day Murders, Don Oiche Ud I mBeithil with Burgess Meredith – amongst many other roles the Penguin from the old Batman TV series – and Jackson Browne singing The Rebel Jesus.
Tend to get annoyed by Christmas music but more from its ‘overmarketted capitalist aspect hearing it constantly in every shopping centre for weeks on end’ than the music as such.
Otara
I actively like Christmas music, especially the religious stuff because most of it’s beautiful, and I’m definitely an atheist.
But then, I’ve never been in a situation where any sort of music is forced on me repeatedly.