Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays?

Do we keep Jesus in the holdiays or succumb to the march of Political Correctness? It seems that there is a stronger than usual grumbling in the land among Christians about the former being replaced with the latter.

Yet secularism marches on. Snopes.com reports that even Wal-Mart, bastion of Red State America and the decline of good taste in general, has officially instructed its employees to use “Happy Holidays” rather than “Merry Christmas.”

I remember in my formative years thinking that Chanakkah was THE major Jewish holiday rather than a minor celebration on the Jewish calendar. “Merry Christmas” was the standard greeting since you assumed everyone was Christian, except those few you knew for a fact were Jews. No other religions counted because there were no other religions in the neighborhood and Kwanzaa hadn’t been invented yet. It was also common knowledge that atheists never celebrated anything worthwhile and didn’t exist in places where God fearing folks lived so they could be safely ignored.

Sending “Christmas Cards” got a bit tricky when you expanded your circle later on and couldn’t be 100% certain about religious affiliations. Under those circumstances “Happy Holidays” was a safe alternative. I’ve since solved that problem; I never send any cards around the holidays.

Needless to say this secularization on top of the rampant commercialization of Christmas has some folks, read that Conservative Evangelical Christians, up in arms. Now I tend to agree with the Evangelical Christian population in this country on absolutely nothing but this time they sort of have a point. Despite the fact that there are more Pagan traditions associated with Christmas today than Christian traditions, it is a Christian religious holiday isn't it? Isn't it bad enough that Jesus gets lost in the shopping spree without losing sight of why there is a shopping spree to begin with? Oh yeah, that’s right, there’s a shopping spree because the Romans used to give each other good luck gifts for the festival of Saturnalia, a tradition which the Church decided to tame and convert into a celebration of the birth of Jesus rather than abolish because it was so popular.

Well then, what about the sanctity of the day Jesus was born? Oh yeah, that's right, no one really knows what time of the year Jesus was born. December 25th was the date of the birth of Mithra and was also absorbed by early Christianity as a convenient date to celebrate the nativity. Oh yeah wise guy, well they only celebrated Mithra's birthday one day, what about the 12 days of Christmas? Oh yeah, that's right, that started in Mesopotamia with the festival of Zagmuk which was celebrated for 12 days before the New Year in order to assist the god Marduk in his struggle against the monsters of chaos. Yes, that's the same Marduk that supposedly dictated the Code of Hammurabi "so that the strong might not harm the weak."

Ahhh, but the sentiments of "Peace on Earth, Good will toward Men" are Christian and that's what Christmas should be all about right? Well, actually, the words may come from the Gospel of Luke but the sentiments also come from the Roman pagan winter solstice celebrations. By tradition, during the festival of Saturnalia, the courts were closed, the dispensing of punishments was suspended and, like with the Olympic Truce, even wars were halted during the celebration. The tradition of a "Christmas Truce" extends back to well before the birth of Jesus.

Ok, let’s face it, Christmas is never going to be a solemn Christian celebration ever again (assuming it ever was one to begin with). So does that mean the Christmas Season of happy memory should be totally absorbed by a secular Holiday Season? Instead of Christmas we have the combined holidays of Christmas, Chanukkah and Kwanzaa?

What the hell is Kwanzaa anyway? I had to look it up and, to be quite honest, I’m not sure I agree with all of its principles. I’m especially suspicious of Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) and Imani (Faith). The former strikes me as more than a tad clannish, always fraught with peril in a pluralistic society, and the latter strikes me as calling for unlimited faith in “leaders” which is always a bad idea. Besides, phrases like “the victory of our struggle” always cause me to raise an eyebrow or two. Bottom line, some of the Kwanzaa principles don’t strike me as particularly workable in a 21st century melting pot sort of country.

So where does that leave us? I sort of sympathize with Christians but I’m not particularly ready to promote the singing of “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing” at public school assemblies nor the putting up of 15 foot crèches, to the exclusion of other religious and secular symbols of the season, in front of the town hall. On the other hand, if a town that is 99.9% Christian decides to put up only a crèche, I wouldn’t necessarily be ready to sic the ACLU on them either. There is usually both a crèche and a menorah on display in my town. Although I don’t recall any Santas or Frostys contributing any secular content, I’m ok with that display as it is.

Simple courtesy says “Happy Holidays” is the way to go, but simple courtesy has never been a strong point of the average Evangelical Christian. So I guess this is another case of “do what you want” but don’t expect me to “do what you want.” Unfortunately that’s a message they don’t seem to get on any other question so there’s no reason to expect they’ll get it on this one.

Personally I tend to reverse my childhood strategy, now it’s “Happy Holidays,” unless I’m certain it’s a Christian I’m speaking to that would prefer “Merry Christmas.” Just for kicks, I think I’ll keep track of which people, and places, use which terms this year.