What are we talking about today?

I'll get back to theme days once I find a groove of posting regularly. In the meantime, most of my posts are about some variation of books, bikes, buses, or Broadway. Plus bits about writing, nonprofits, and grief from time to time.

This blog is mostly lighthearted and pretty silly. It's not about the terrible things happening in the world, but please know that I'm not ignoring those things. I just generally don't write about them here.

24 November 2010

Do We Have This Backwards?

I briefly mentioned the “Happy Holidays” people and the “Merry Christmas” people yesterday. And I’ve pretty much expanded on them all that I intend to do, except for one detail: It’s important to remember to take what the media says, or what you see on TV, or what you read in your email, with a grain of salt. And in today’s climate, perhaps with an entire salt shaker.


Why do I say this? Because with the immediacy of the internet and the 24-hour news cycle, one local occurrence can get national coverage in an instant. And as we have seen often enough, there are plenty of people who pull stupid stunts because of the news cycle; they are reaching for their 15 minutes of fame. So, please, neither give them the satisfaction of riling you, nor give yourself an ulcer over the stuff you hear on TV; there’s a good chance it’s been blown way out of proportion.

The people who mostly wail over the de-Christ-ing of Christmas are Christians, naturally. And I certainly respect their right to feel this way, act this way, shop this way, etc. I just wish they wouldn't spill it on me so often. And I get a bit confused sometimes, because I belong to a conservative Protestant denomination that for the first 18 years of my life told me that Christmas is not a Christian holiday.

Then I turned 18 and all heaven broke loose. It would seem that we have changed our collective mind. Sorta. We don’t have Christmas Eve services or celebrate Advent, but by golly, we bake things and make our contribution to the economy. I read an article this time last year—and I’ve tried to find it, but have not had any luck thus far—that said that early in the 20th century, Christians were horrified as each successive year Christmas became more and more a holiday of materialism and gift-giving, and less and less a holiday of focusing on Jesus. So much so, in fact, that many of them stopped celebrating the holiday altogether, rather that endorse such behaviour in the name of Jesus. A lesson for us all, perhaps.

4 comments:

a runners' life said...

Good point, it's definitely hard to tell what's true and what isn't nowadays.

I like Christmas for the fact that it's a time of year that I can spend with my family, eat yummy food guiltlessly and buy presents for everyone. I actually enjoy the gift buying more than the receiving when it comes to Christmas. I just wish that the advertising would start two weeks before not two months before the actual holiday.

Anonymous said...

the whole humble Christmas scene of Jesus' birth is loooooonng gone. It doesn't resemble anything even close to Christmas anymore.

Timbra said...

i was talking to a friend who considers herself "christian" last year, she was making fun of a friend who is atheist, but celebrates Christmas. . . as though she didn't have a right to, unless she wanted to admit there was a God on the other 364 days/year. . . but I reminded her that Christmas is more of a commercial holiday than anything now, and yet, my atheist friend admitted to me "you teach your kids what you believe EVERY day of the year, not just on christmas.". . . I don't know,none of this has a real point other than. . . "stop spilling on me" (thanks Susan)

Su said...

@runner: I agree; I would spend the whole of the Christmas season in Hobby Lobby, just looking and buying fun stuff, if I didn't have time/budget constraints. And yeah, the novelty wears off once it's been around for six weeks.

@Charlie: I know, and it makes me sad.

@Timbra: Hee hee. I guess I've invited the spilling upon myself this year, by blogging about it for a week.