From my office window, I can see my neighbor's mailbox which is currently draped in flashing red and green lights. It's got a variable flash interval which is just good entertainment. I know, it's War on Christmas time and I shouldn't be calling Christmas lights entertaining - I should be mad, or out smashing them with a baseball bat, what being Jewish and all.
I had a breakthrough this year, though - not one of appreciating Christmas suddenly - I've always been down with Christmas. As a kid, I helped our neighbors decorate their tree every year and as a quasi-adult, I had Christmas trees in my home when the person I was dating or my roomie (depending on the year) wanted one. My last Christmas tree with my final roommate was so tiny that we decorated it with hanging earrings.
Anyway, my breakthrough was that I'm not the one starting or perpetuating the War on Christmas - nor are people like the Seattle rabbi who wanted a menorah displayed with the Christmas trees at the airport or the ACLU or whoever it was that decided to list school holidays as "winter break" rather than "Christmas break". It's people like this, this and this who are waging war.
Meanwhile, the rest of us are celebrating or preparing to celebrate whatever holiday it is we celebrate and having a grand old time at it. What the Christmas warriors don't seem to understand is that this is not an issue of exclusiveness - I'd like to think that schools and malls have switched to generic holiday greetings not because of some imaginary lawsuit over political correctness but because they hope to include all members of the melting pot that is America in their seasonal joy.
Just thinking that people are trying to exclude Christians from their own holiday gives me a little chuckle - can a generic holiday greeting change or in any way impact the fact that the Christian Savior was born over two thousand years ago? Can my holiday greeting keep you from decorating your tree or attending midnight mass or spending Christmas morning watching your kids tear through presents? I'm crazy powerful if it can.
On the flip side, can placing luminaries in front of my house while I'm away at my family's Hannukah celebration impact my holiday? Whereas a holiday greeting is inclusive of all, luminaries are specifically related to Christmas... Of course the luminaries didn't change our lighting the menorah or opening presents or eating latkes but it did piss me off. I have no problem with luminaries - they're very pretty all lined up along the street, but Christmas is not my holiday and it is a slight to mine and my husband's actual spiritual practices to place a Christmas symbol in front of our house without our consent.
But I'm over it because Hannukah was fun and my in-law's Christmas celebration, for which my Jewish mother is joining us, is right around the corner. Then it's a long, 11 month wait for the next War on Christmas.
Happy Holidays!
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3 comments:
"and it is a slight to mine and my husband's actual spiritual practices to place a Christmas symbol in front of our house without our consent." Getting a bit out of sorts here arn't we. What happened to a little bit of multicultural sensitivity.
Strange-or is it? You felt perfectly comfortable mocking Thanksgiving and the people who see that day as a period of religious reflection-but, oh, let someone intrude on the vague belief system of the Jewish-American princess and "We are the World" quickly dissolves into " Get of my Cloud."
The luminary is hardly a Christian symbol and I think your neighbors were just trying to be nice. You took offense; but can't understand that many people took offense at your November letter. Your kind of thinking crushes all kinds of religious/cultural expressions.
You a JAP? Hahaheehee!!! Makes as much sense as the War on Christmas and the War on Terror.
C'mon Super-Taster - you've seen my fur stoles and massive diamond rings. Anonymous has totally seen through my laid-back, earth-mother online persona and straight into the vault behind the Picasso - that's not a print, by the way - and into my greedy Jewess heart.
Nice of a shiksa like you to defend me, though!
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