Just wanted to agree on the bitchiness of Kyle’s mom. Those poor kids, having their good time spoiled by someone more concerned with their own agenda than the well being of any children involved. She sucks.
ETA: And I also, as a Christian, see the religious side for those who are devout and just plain ol’ Christmas for those who aren’t. Santa, obviously, is part of the latter group, regardless of origins.
I’m with the mother. OK to mention the holiday but completely inappropriate to write letters to Santa or to take a field trip to see Santa. The argument that these are all secular symbols doesn’t hold water. If that is true, then why not change the gift giving and tree decorating to Arbor Day? Why does the celebration have to be tied to Christmas? It’s one thing to teach about a variety of holidays and maybe even have them sing songs or play games typical of each holiday but it is something entirely different to arrange an entire field trip and classroom assignments around a tradition that is tied to a religious holiday. Not to mention that some families don’t want their children to believe in Santa Claus and asking these children to write letters and sit on Santa’s lap is not appropriate. If parents want to teach children to believe in fantasy figures that can do so in the home.
Yeah, but has she got it going on?
Brings a tear to the eye of a brother. sniff When is the Hallmark Channel movie being broadcast?
Why I wish “Happy Holidays,” from another thread (with revisions):
The Easter holiday season, starting with Western Ash Wednesday, 2/10, and ending on Eastern Pentecost on 6/19, with everybody having a holiday or five in between, starts to be awkwardly long. The lesson is that every day somebody is celebrating a holiday, and if you wish everybody a happy holiday some will be pleased by your inclusiveness. And everybody else will be offended.
I don’t have the kinks worked out.
Sorry, but this is pretty hard to support. The central message of the holiday is religious. It’s a religious celebration, that also has many secular aspects.
I think you’ll find a lot more people in the US who are not devout still celebrate some religious aspects of the holiday.
Santa secular? No, it’s not. Christmas may be chosen to be celebrated in a secular way, but Christmas and its trappings are a religious holiday. You may pray for the future of this country on 4th of July, but it’s not a religious holiday. You may ignore the religion in Christmas, but that doesn’t make it secular.
FWIW a teacher once sent my son to the principal’s office for saying he didn’t believe in Santa, after he had been directly asked by another kid. I’m not sure it’s the non-Christains who can be over sensitive here.
You’ll also find many atheists and Jews who celebrate Christmas. You can celebrate Christmas completely secular you know.
ETA: sure it does. On Christmas my family exchanges presents under a tree, we have A Christmas Story playing on TV, and at night we may drive around looking at lights. We’re all Jews/atheists. There is nothing whatsoever religious in how we celebrate Christmas.
I’ve never been given the choice, my office has always been closed on Christmas. I’ve always taken the High Holidays off and either used vacation time or organized comp time with my boss for those days.
I’ve never worked retail or other 24/7 type jobs, but Jewish friends have often volunteered to work on Christmas or Easter when needed. In the past (before I married a Catholic woman) I would go eat dinner in Chinatown with Jewish friends and catch a movie. If I had to work it wouldn’t have mattered to me.
I can’t.
Too soon/late to point out that there is biblical justification for placing Jesus’ b’day in December? Please try to disregard all the math mumbo-jumbo to place it there. The only biblical reference seems to put the birth in springtime.
As a pastafarian - The existence of Jesus is not ironclad but I’ll give it some slack in that some similar folks with religious reform motivations were out and about. Many of you may not believe in Santa; but the whole virgin birth, manger, stable (Joseph wouldn’t have put up with that crap), wise men, census/tax payment, star, probably the wrong Bethlehem, etc… doesn’t go down without a whole pillar of salt. Santa and the elves seems to have a better PR narrative and equal believability index.
(why yes, I do go around putting toy soldiers and Star Wars characters in people’s nativities. Why?
Only Jews I know who celebrate Christmas are in interfaith marriages, so they’re honoring their spouses traditions. I get Christmas off too, because it’s winter break. Most of society is organized to make celebrating Christian holidays easy. To observe my holidays I have to twist my schedule around, or more often, don’t celebrate it. It’d be nice if Christians recognized how easy it is to observe their holidays to whatever degree they want and give the rest of us a break from making Christian traditions now just American traditions.
That’s up to you then, but it’s false to say other people can’t celebrate a secular Christmas.
Again, one can, but that doesn’t make it inherently a secular holiday.
Well said–thank you. All kinds of non-Christian families celebrate (in one way or another) what is essentially a non-Christian tradition in the U.S. that is called “Christmas.” (Don’t let the name fool you.)
Right. There’s no religious reason for Jews not to do these things, too. They’re no different than shooting off fireworks on the 4th of July.
Those who pretend that they are practicing Christianity with all these things are full of it. They might as well throw off the pretense and just enjoy it for what it is, without all the hypocrisy.
If one is honest about it, one will admit that it is secular–at least throughout the majority of the U.S.–no matter what people say. The Church tried to make it Christian, and one can argue about to what degree it was originally successful, but Americans have re-paganized it.
Yes, Americans give all kinds of lip service to trite religious notions when Christmas comes around, but, like most (Christian) religious talk in America, it’s mostly for show.
No matter how you spin it, it’s not a secular holiday. Doesn’t make me dishonest to see it that way. I’ve never met a Jew who felt it was secular. So those of you who celebrate it may not understand how it feels to someone who actively identifies with another cultural tradition. Frankly, it’s kind of rude of those people to keep insisting that how I feel about it is simply wrong. Of course it feels secular to folks in the mainstream, but it’s not.
I’m not sure why it’s so important to people to make it mainstream and secular. Why it’s so important to convince folks like me that I’m wrong.
There are two holidays, both unfortunately celebrated on the same date, and going by the same name. The one, called Christmas, is a secular holiday marked by trees, Santa, presents and an explosion of mercantile excess. The other, named Christmas, is a liturgically relatively unimportant commemorating of Christ’s birth, marked by a religious service and for some, a nativity scene. Protesting a manger? Go for it. Protesting Santa? Stupid.
The two things are not mutually exclusive. No one wants to deny your feelings. The point is that you shouldn’t think your feelings result from any kind of religious piety on the part of those celebrating Christmas, because that religious piety doesn’t exist. You might say they result from ethnic exclusion, but that’s something different.
I am real! :mad:
Sorry, Johnny L.A., but you’re wrong on this one.
No, that’s Stacy’s Mom :o :smack:
Wrong. It got it’s start as a religious holiday. While this country is majority Christian, there are millions of people who are neither Pagans nor Christians & therefore shouldn’t be forced to celebrate an event for another religion. Writing letters to Santa & a field trip to see Santa/sit on his lap is inappropriate. Independence Day is about the founding of this country; there’s no religious basis to that day.
I hear what your saying, but frankly I think it’s a distinction without a difference. Call it what you will, but it’s rather patronizing for those folks to say that it’s no big deal, we Jews could celebrate if wanted to, without understanding that most of us don’t want to and don’t want it to become just another secukar/American holiday.
ETA: reply to guizot
You don’t have to let the Christians steal the season, the evergreens and lights and presents and all things ending in “olly”.
I never saw Santa as a religious figure, even as a Catholic child.
The season always had three components. The Christian religious holiday, the secular gift-giving holiday, and the undefined pagan holiday (Druids and mistletoe and Germans and tannenbaume and Yule logs and Stonehenge and the solstice). Santa was definitely secular.
I am still mildly nauseated by displays with both Santa and a manger scene; I find them blasphemous, and I am no longer religious.