Photo: Wikipedia

Two days after the Star Tribune carried Garrison Keillor’s War-on-Christmas op-ed, the paper prints a “Counterpoint” by Mitch Pearlstein, president of the Center of the American Experiment. Pearlstein calls Keillor “nasty” but “brilliant” — and agrees that Christmas is under seige.

Point by point, Pearlstein paraphrases Keillor and seconds his emotion.

“Christians are more frequently dismissed and ignored when they believe their traditions are dishonored than is the case with members of other faiths”

“I appreciate the point,” writes Pearlstein.

“[I]t has grown increasingly hard to celebrate Christmas in publicly full-throated and spirited ways.”

“I stand with him,” writes Pearlstein.

“[H]e’s had enough of ubiquitous sensitivity specialists staying up late worrying about whether otherwise decent men and women might possibly wish their diverse fellows ‘Merry Christmas’ instead of ‘Happy Holidays,’ thereby offending finely tuned feelings”

“I’m with him again,” writes Pearlstein.

“[S]teamed-up lawyers are bullet-fast to seek injunctions if a village chooses to add a crèche to its square”

Pearlstein writes, “the same holds.”

And while he’s counterpointing Keillor, Pearlstein extends the War-on-Christmas argument for good measure:

… why aren’t minority groups (defined in both religious and other ways) more readily expected to be just as respectful of the traditions and prerogatives of majority groups as majority groups are obliged to be respectful of theirs?

With counterpoint writers like Pearlstein, who needs friends?

Photo: Jonathunder, Wikipedia

Garrison Keillor rages from the battlements of the War on Christmas in his column this week, telling Unitarians and Jews and other heathens that “Christmas is a Christian holiday — if you’re not in the club, then buzz off.”

Unitarians (who Keillor regularly but good-naturedly ribs on his radio show) seem to have set him off with a modified Christmas carol:

If you don’t believe Jesus was God, OK, go write your own damn “Silent Night” and leave ours alone. This is spiritual piracy and cultural elitism and we Christians have stood for it long enough. And all those lousy holiday songs by Jewish guys that trash up the malls every year, Rudolph and the chestnuts and the rest of that dreck. Did one of our guys write “Grab your loafers, come along if you wanna, and we’ll blow that shofar for Rosh Hashanah”? No, we didn’t.

There must be something in the water in Anoka, a hometown Keillor shares with U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, (who the other day called him a “genius“). In her first Christmas in Congress, Bachmann co-sponsored a  ”Christmas Bill” (it passed), which read in part:

[T]he House of Representatives recognizes the Christian faith as one of the great religions of the world; expresses continued support for Christians in the United States and worldwide; acknowledges the international religious and historical importance of Christmas and the Christian faith; acknowledges and supports the role played by Christians and Christianity in the founding of the United States and in the formation of the western civilization; rejects bigotry and persecution directed against Christians, both in the United States and worldwide; and expresses its deepest respect to American Christians and Christians throughout the world.

Update: Bachmann has a new Christmas Bill this year.

And another Anokan, “Fox and Friends” co-host Gretchen Carlson, who Bachmann once babysat, made the point more succinctly last Christmas season:

What’s changed is the whole politically correct environment that we live in. I’m all for people to have their rights of free speech. Just don’t choose December 25th to do it.

[Via The Daily Glean]

"Go Christmas, Go Hanukkah, Go Kwanzaa..." The Gap's 2009 holiday ad. Source: YouTube

The religious right’s annual “War on Christmas” is ramping up early this year, and at least one Minnesota-based company is on its hit list. For the past few years, the American Family Association has targeted retail corporations that use the word “holiday” instead of “Christmas” in their holiday marketing. On Thursday, the group said it’s a trend that began with the Nazis.

AFA lists Eden Prairie-based SUPERVALU, which runs Cub Foods, as a “retailer against Christmas” because the company “refers to Christmas decorations as ‘holiday’ on website and weekly ads.”

Bloomington-based Best Buy does a little better, making the list under “Companies marginalizing ‘Christmas.’” Best Buy was the AFA’s primary target in 2006, but ended up capitulating.

Minneapolis-based Target is the state’s only retail corporation listed among “Companies FOR ‘Christmas’” by the AFA. Target incurred the wrath of the AFA’s first War on Christmas campaign in 2005 with a massive Christian boycott. The company relented in mid-December of that year in response to AFA pressure.

The AFA’s main target in the War on Christmas this year is the Gap, Inc., and its subsidiaries Old Navy and Banana Republic. On Nov. 11, the AFA launched a two-month boycott of those brands.

“Last year, Gap issued this politically-correct statement to Christmas shoppers: ‘Gap recognizes that many traditions are celebrated throughout this season and we feel it is important to display holiday signage that is inclusive to everyone,’” wrote the AFA. “Christmas is special because of Jesus. It’s not just a ‘winter holiday.’ For millions of Americans the giving and receiving of gifts is in honor of the One who gave Himself. For the Gap to pretend that isn’t the foundation of the Christmas season is political correctness at best and religious bigotry at worst.”

The Gap responded with an ad campaign that does include the word “Christmas,” but remained true to their commitment to be inclusive. The ad features young adults in a holiday cheer:

Two, Four, Six, Eight, now’s the time to liberate
Go Christmas, Go Hanukkah, Go Kwanzaa, Go Solstice.
Go classic tree, go plastic tree, go plant a tree, go add a tree,
You 86 the rules, you do what feels just right.
Happy do whatever you wanukkah, and to all a cheery night.

The AFA was not amused.

“Did you notice it? Gap compares Christmas to the pagan holiday called ‘Solstice.’ Solstice is celebrated by Wiccans who practice witchcraft!” cried the AFA in a press release.

In a statement the Gap accused the AFA of dishonesty. “Our brands have periodically used Christmas in their holiday season advertising. With this year’s Gap and Old Navy ads, we hope that the AFA will update its Web site, which has claimed that Gap Inc. ‘refused to use the word Christmas in its advertising,’” the statement said. “This is untrue.”

While the AFA is targeting domestic retailers, their rationale goes back to Nazi Germany.

On Thursday, Bryan Fischer, AFA Director of Issues Analysis, penned an article called, “Nazis Started War Against Christmas,” which inexplicably conflates the Gap’s advertising with Nazi “holiday” ornaments.

He refers to a Daily Mail article about secular Christmas ornaments used in Germany during the rise of the Nazis to make the case that the Nazis were atheists.

“The Daily Mail story refers to ‘the atheist Nazis, who tried to turn (Christmas) into a pagan winter solstice celebration,’” he wrote. “Can you say ‘Hello, Gap?’ The Gap responded to pressure from the American Family Association about the absence of ‘Christmas’ in their advertising by producing a commercial that does mention Christmas, but then adds ‘Go Solstice’ in the next breath.”

He continued, “The Nazis hated Christmas for one simple reason: it celebrates the birth of a Jew. The left hates Christmas because it celebrates the birthday of the first Christian. But isn’t there something faintly anti-Semitic about that? After all, Christians can hardly be accused of systemic racism when we believe the Savior of the world lived his life on earth as a Jew.”

Coleman lights the Capitol menorah (Fox 9 News)

Washington state’s capitol has been beset with proliferating religious displays this holiday season — some of which are being taken as shots across the bow in the annual “War on Christmas” promoted on Fox News. “Fox and Friends” co-host and former Miss America Gretchen Carlson has been especially exercised about it, citing her Minnesota roots as she attacked a Festivus display at the Washington’s state capitol and free speech on Dec. 25 generally.

Minnesota’s own state capitol has been comparatively quiet, though a stray line in a recent TV news story caught my ear: U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman was on hand, the newscaster said, for the lighting of “the Capitol Menorah.” Wait a sec, I thought: “Capitol Menorah”? Does Minnesota state government sponsor religious displays?

A call to Jim Schwartz, who issues use permits for the capitol grounds as part of his job at the state Department of Administration, put my fears to rest. The menorah is put up by a private group and is the only religious display at the Ccpitol during the year, he said — not including, of course, the state capitol’s holiday tree, a living evergreen not far from the menorah on the grounds near the Capitol’s west wing. The tree is decorated each year by Department of Administration staff and is lit by Gov. Tim Pawlenty and First Lady Mary Pawlenty — this year the lighting took place during a Dec. 4 ceremony.

A group of rabbis from the Upper Midwest Merkos-Lubavitch House submitted the Capitol Facilities Use Request for the giant menorah on the Capitol grounds, Schwartz said, as they have for nine years now. In its application, the group wrote that the menorah is a “symbol of freedom … especially freedom of minorities from the tyranny of dictatorships,” Schwartz said. A call to the group so far hasn’t been returned. The menorah at the state capitol will remain through Dec. 29.

Washington state is ground zero for this year’s war after the government allowed a nativity scene on the Capitol grounds. The overtly Christian display led some atheists to request that their own sign be permitted, and the government relented. Then a Festivus fan wanted the traditional pole placed at the Capitol. But when Fred Phelps wanted to install a sign saying that Santa is a child molester who sends people to hell, Gov. Chris Gregoire said enough is enough and declared a moratorium on new religious (and areligious) displays until the matter could be reviewed.

When Chuck Norris heard of the flap, the actor planted his roundhouse kick firmly on the atheists he blames for starting the mess in the first place.

“Atheists from England to the West Coast of America are stepping up their efforts this year to make a bigger antagonistic splash on the Christmas scene,” said Chuck. “I am a patriot, and I believe that atheists are free to believe, speak and post whatever they want. This is America, and that’s their First Amendment right. But to do so with harassment and hatred under the guise of free speech is despicable. An anti-religious poster filled with spite is in no way equal to a religious symbol, such as a Nativity scene. Where are the political correctness police when religious followers are the victims?”

And while Chuck might believe in free speech, Gretchen Carlson, former Minnesota beauty queen and current Fox News “War on Christmas” correspondent, says not so much: “I’m all for free speech and free rights, just not on December 25th.”

Perpetually outraged William Donahue of the Catholic League weighed in: It’s the gay marriage supporters who are to blame.

“The root cause of the war on Christmas, which is conducted almost exclusively by well-educated white people in the U.S., Canada, Europe and Australia — the very same people who like gay marriage — has almost nothing to do with fidelity to law (the First Amendment in the U.S.): it has to do with ideology. The ideology is plainly an expression of left-wing secularism, and it is nothing if not anti-Western and anti-Christian. At its worst, it is driven by hatred; at its best, it is driven by a defensive posture, a deep sense of embarrassment over the legacy of Western civilization. There is no historical or moral justification for either. Moreover, those who are pushing this agenda generally lie about their work.”

Despite fingering white, educated seculars, Donahue in his next breath plays the Muslim card. “[T]his hatred of Christmas is not exclusive to the U.S. In England, Muslim preacher Anjem Choudary called Christmas ‘evil’ in a recent sermon.”

Choudary did warn Muslims not to celebrate Christmas. “Every Muslim has a responsibility to protect his family from the misguidance of Christmas, because its observance will lead to hellfire. Protect your Paradise from being taken away – protect yourself and your family from Christmas,” he said.

While Donahue and Norris impart the wisdom of the founding fathers on Christmas, they missed an important part of history. The religious folk who began the American dream said roughly the same thing as the Muslim professor: Celebrating Christmas is the road to hell.

“The generality of Christmas-keepers observe that festival after such a manner as is highly dishonourable to the name of Christ,” said the Rev. Increase Mather in 1687. “How few are there comparatively that spend those holidays (as they are called) after an holy manner. But they are consumed in Compotations, in Interludes, in playing at Cards, in Revellings, in excess of Wine, in mad Mirth…”

In fact, conservative Christians banned Christmas in Massachusetts — the state that gave us gay marriage — until 1855.

Who will win the “War on Christmas”? If playing the Nazi card is an indication of having lost the debate, then the Minnesota Family Council may have put it out of play for the religious right.

“Some insist that singing a Christmas carol in a public school is a state endorsement of religion,” writes Family Council Communications Director Chuck Darrell. “Would the same people insist that reading Mien Kampf in social studies is a state endorsement of National Socialism (Nazis) as well? So tell me, what’s the difference?”

Over the past day, Gretchen Carlson, a co-host of “Fox & Friends” and the last Minnesotan to become Miss America (1989), invoked her local roots as part of a full-court press to put the issue – now an annual holiday tradition in its own right at Fox News — back on the national front burner. She started with a segment Wednesday morning on a controversy about a religious display at the Washington state Capitol. That night Bill O’Reilly, who has been working the latest wrinkles in this ratings-boosting war for at least a week, invited Carlson to appear on “The O’Reilly Factor.” Her gist: Freedom of speech is fine, but not on Christmas Day.

Transcript excerpts after the jump. Gretchen Carlson with Bill O’Reilly on “The O’Reilly Factor,” Dec. 10, 2008:

O’REILLY: So you were brought up in Minnesota, right?

CARLSON: Exactly.

O’REILLY: OK, now think back many, many years ago to when you were a child.

CARLSON: Thank you, Bill.

O’REILLY: I do that to everybody. None of this existed, correct?

CARLSON: No, my grandfather was a minister. So I have to – I’ll say that because I grew up spending a lot of time in the church.

O’REILLY: But none of it existed. There was no controversy over Christmas. …

CARLSON: We actually called it Christmas. …

O’REILLY: … What’s changed?

CARLSON: What’s changed is the whole politically correct environment that we live in. I’m all for people to have their rights of free speech. Just don’t choose December 25th to do it.

O’REILLY: Well, don’t be disrespectful. You can have freedom of speech without being disrespectful.

This morning, Carlson’s “Fox & Friends” co-host Steve Doocy picked up where O’Reilly left off in trying to talk her down.

DOOCY: We’ve got to be tolerant of people who celebrate holidays in December, like Ramadan [sic]. We’ve got to be tolerant. You’ve got to be tolerant of all people.

CARLSON: I am tolerant. I’m all for free speech and free rights, just not on December 25th.

The argument is a strawman, of course. The War on Christmas is really just another front in the culture wars, another way for religious extremists to complain that nonbelievers are not compelled to sing Christian hymns this time of year, or any other time of year. And though this is a silly war, it has a few casualties: Last week, four students were attacked in a subway car in New York City for responding to “Merry Christmas” with “Happy Hanukkah.”

Religious extremists like to claim that they’re pushing us back to a better, more moral, more ethical time. That they’re simply rekindling old traditions, the way things used to be. They like to claim that they are simply trying to restore Christmas to its former grandeur, to honor the way the holiday was celebrated, presumably throughout history. But Christmas has not always been celebrated as it is today. Indeed, Christmas hasn’t even always been Christmas. And arguing that Christmas has had a specific and constant way to be celebrated ignores the history of the holiday.* * *

It is an accident of history that the West is primarily Christian. Looking at history, it’s easy to see how we could have ended up Mithraists, or Mandeanists, or Muslims, or pagans, or Zeus-worshippers, or any of dozens of other contenders for the souls of humankind. Had the Maccabees failed in their rebellion against Antiochus IV Epiphanes, Judaism would have been radically different at the time of the birth of Jesus Christ, would have been subordinate to Zeus worship. Had not Constantine I made Christianity the state religion of the Eastern Roman Empire, it is likely that we’d be adherents to Mithras. Had the Franks lost the Battle of Tours, it’s quite possible that the Umayyad Caliphate would have swept Europe, and Islam would be the religion of the West today.

Christians, of course, see this all as the hand of God at work. His support for the righteous Maccabees, the turning of Constantine’s heart from Sol Invictus to Christianity, the support of the Christians against the Muslims. They’re entitled to that point of view, of course, and one cannot state with certainty that they are wrong. Still, those of us who are nonbelievers (and indeed, even many believers) are more likely to think that the Christianity of today is as much a product of luck as sense, a religion that has been shaped by history quite as much as it has shaped history.

I am not a Christian. I was raised a Methodist, but slowly came to the realization that I could not believe that Jesus of Nazareth was literally the Son of God. Now, if one is honest, one knows that wouldn’t have made me a particularly unusual Christian; I know dozens of Christians who don’t believe in Christ’s divinity. But to me, it felt dishonest to be a part of a church whose core tenet I could not honestly profess. In my 20′s, I converted to Unitarian Universalism and have found that church to be a better fit for my faith, which is very nonspecific.

That said, I have long believed there is quite a bit of Christianity that justifies its place as one of the world’s great religions. The philosophy of Jesus is a very sensible and just one — treat-one-another-as-you’d-want-to-be-treated; help the poor, the sick and the needy; turn the other cheek; get the moneychangers out of the temple and focus on God. These are fundamentally sound teachings, and while I don’t believe they came from a god, I believe they did come from a particularly good man, and that as a whole Jesus’ Christianity should be a force for good.

No, I have nothing against Christianity, and think it’s wonderful if people find faith and strength through that religion. But Christmas as a holiday does not have very much to do with Christ. It never has, not since its origins, which predate Jesus himself.

* * *

A close reading of the Gospels tells us that there is almost no chance that Jesus was born on December 25 in the year 0 at the beginning of the Christian era. The history and the timeline are all off, as is the description of the conditions at the time. It’s more likely that Jesus was born in October of 4 BC. So why do we celebrate Christmas when we do?

Well, because Constantine decided it would be that way. December 25 was the day of the Feast of Sol Invictus, the birthdate of both Mithras and Bacchus. The Sol Invictus feast was the culmination to the Saturnalia, a festival that took place the week before. Late December was by its very proximity to the winter solstice a natural time for celebration, and the Saturnalia was a big one. Constantine chose Christianity, but he wanted it to be acceptable to the people, and so he borrowed a bit. He kept the feast, with its gift exchanges and drunken revelry, and changed it to a celebration of Christ’s birth. For your average Roman, little changed. Instead of officially celebrating Mithras or Bacchus, they were now celebrating Christ, but that wasn’t any reason to cancel the party.

And so Christmas remained for well over a millennium — a sort of winter Mardi Gras. The spirit is reflected in the 16th century carol “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”:

Oh, bring us a figgy pudding;
Oh, bring us a figgy pudding;
Oh, bring us a figgy pudding and a cup of good cheer

We won’t go until we get some;
We won’t go until we get some;
We won’t go until we get some, so bring some out here

That was Christmas: drunken revelers going from house to house, demanding food and libations, a raucous, rollicking good time and/or near-riot, depending on your point of view. No wonder Oliver Cromwell banned it.

* * *

There is tremendous irony in the claim that today, secularists are not showing the reverence toward Christmas that our Founding Fathers did. Early Americans were unlikely to care much about the holiday; they celebrated it in the traditional style, with drunken revelry, if at all. It was outlawed for a time in Massachusetts. Congress was regularly in session on Christmas Day. No, not until the 19th century did Christmas as we know it start to flourish. And it was due to two men: Charles Dickens and Santa Claus.

Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, published in 1834, laid out the spiritual template of the holiday as a time of redemption, conviviality, goodwill toward men and charity. One will notice, however, that A Christmas Carol is rather light on Christ. It was not Christ who saved Scrooge, but three spirits. Note also how Christ’s birthday is referenced in praise by Scrooge’s nephew, Fred:

“There are many things from which I might have derived good by which I have not profited, I dare say,” returned the nephew, “Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas-time, when it has come round — apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that — as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!”

Fred speaks of Christmas’ “sacred name and origin,” not of Christ Himself. It is a telling passage. Indeed, though Bob Cratchit requests the day off, it is not seen as beyond the pale that people might work the day; certainly, Scrooge is able to procure a Christmas goose with little trouble.

Nevertheless, A Christmas Carol was a work worthy of its 170 years of fame; it portrayed Christmas as less frenetic and more family-oriented, less bacchanalia and more season of giving. It helped to catalyze the transition of the holiday.

The other major factor, at least in America, was Clement Clark Moore’s 1860 poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” also known by its opening line, “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas.” Moore didn’t create St. Nick, but he borrowed liberally from European traditions, especially the Dutch tradition of Sinterklaas. The poem is explicit in this being a children’s holiday. And in a country torn apart by civil war, it offered a template for some semblance of home and family celebration.

After the American Civil War, progressives here and in Britain aggressively pushed Christmas as a time for home and family, believing that it would be a force for moral good, a way to help bring families together. Shopkeepers, no fools themselves, began to push the idea of gift-giving as an end in and of itself. This combination led us to where we are today. Modern Christmas had been born.

* * *

If it seems that Christ is but a bit player in the development of Christmas, you’ve been paying attention. The holiday that ostensibly celebrates Christ’s birthday is almost purely pagan or secular in origin. That’s not to say that Christ isn’t worth celebrating. He has a perfectly good holiday celebrating his death and resurrection. It’s called Easter, and the pagan bunny-and-eggs notwithstanding, it’s primarily celebrated, as it should be by Christians, as a memorial to Christ’s sacrifice.

There is nothing wrong with noting Christ on Christmas, of course. For those who worship Jesus, pausing to remember his origin is an understandable part of the holiday.  But Christmas is not, has not, and will not be primarily about its namesake. It is a good holiday – one that celebrates family, friends, and togetherness, charity and humility. But it doesn’t really celebrate Christ – other than by virtue of the fact that He was all for those things, too.

More than that, Christmas has never had one specific template for celebration, one specific order of worship. Those who tell us that they wish to bring Christmas back to its origins have no idea what those origins are. And that’s a greater insult to the day than wishing someone “Happy Holiday!” could ever be.