So about this war on Christmas…
Every year, in the midst of the holiday season, full of yuletide cheer, the Fox News types take up their cry that America is waging a war on Christmas. This claim is as perennial as the Christmas trees, wreaths, and lights that are the hallmarks of the season. From the first Black Friday sale through the New Year, Americans everywhere are defending Father Christmas from these heinous attacks. Or at least that’s what Fox News would have you believe.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and piss lots of people off when I call bullshit on that claim. People are decorating their homes, buying and wrapping gifts, and making plans with family and friends to celebrate the holiday. So what’s the problem? Apparently, this war on Christmas boils down to one all-important fact: sometimes the greeters in Wal-Mart and the cashiers at Target have the nerve to wish their customers “Happy Holidays” (gasp!), instead of “Merry Christmas”. Shall I fetch the smelling salts to revive you?
As a Jew, I have to tell you that the “Merry Christmas” exchange has no good ending for me. If I say, “Merry Christmas” in response, then I ignore my own traditions to respond “appropriately”. If I say, “Oh, thank you, but I celebrate Chanukah”, then there’s the awkward, “Well, Happy Chanukah” from the checkout person, even though Chanukah ended three weeks earlier. And if I say the blasphemous “Happy Holidays” in response, well then I’m just a soldier in the War on Christmas army. I can’t win…what’s a Heeb to do? I can imagine that the Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, and atheists have had similar experiences, and honestly, it’s just uncomfortable.
I don’t see what the big deal with saying “Have a wonderful holiday season” is, and how this is an attack on Christmas and Christianity as a whole. I respect the holiday and my friends who celebrate it, but while this nation is mostly Christian, that’s not the case for all of us. I don’t see how acknowledging the diversity in our nation is an attack on any one faith. And I really don’t understand how a holiday that holds so much importance in the Christian faith is so easily affected by what a Wal-Mart greeter says or doesn’t say as you’re checking out.
I grew up in a mostly Jewish community, and when I went away to college in rural Northern New York, I was struck by the fact that many people off of Long Island had never met a Jew, and were entirely unaware of our holidays and traditions. That made me feel isolated and lonely at times, particularly during the holidays, and I had to really look inward to find a sense of Jewish identity. If I had relied on the stores, the school calendar, or the events around the campus to provide me with a sense of spirituality and faith, I would have come up with very little to sustain me. While they weren’t always easy, those years gave me a real appreciation for my faith and its traditions, something that I hadn’t always felt when I was on Long Island. Although I returned to Long Island after college, the lesson that I am responsible for my own spirituality, and for creating traditions in my family, has remained with me.
Which is why I’m so confounded by this whole “War on Christmas” thing. We live in a country where everyone is free to practice (or not practice) their faith as they see fit. There are an abundance of religious institutions where you can worship without fear. This is what people in other nations long for, and have died for. With that in mind, how on earth can anyone say that we have any sort of religious war going on based on the checkout girl at Kohl’s holiday (oops, I did it again!) greetings? I’ve thought about this quite a bit, and all that I can come up with is that if people need to hear retail employees wish them a “Merry Christmas” to feel that their faith and tradition is “safe”, then perhaps they need to reevaluate what drives their beliefs in the first place. As far as I’m concerned, if your spirituality is defined by Wal-Mart’s/Target’s/Kohl’s saying “Merry Christmas”, then perhaps the perpetrator of the war on Christmas is…you.
Amen!