If you want a pretty good summary about this topic see Skye Jethani’s video “Is There Really a War on Christmas?” His favorite things to say is “Which war on Christmas?”
In the United States the first war on Christmas was when early Americans, the Puritans, objected to celebrating Christmas because it was considered a pagan holiday. Early Christians didn’t celebrate the birth of Christ and by 1855 only half of the states even recognized the holiday as most Christians didn’t even celebrate Advent. Christmas gained a resurgence around 1850 when Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Story. Christmas was further energized in the early 1900s by retailers wanting to fuel buying as they used St. Nick to boost sales. In 2005, the last war on Christmas was actually sparked by a Catholic, Bill O’Reiley, and later fanned by Fox news hosts when people reacted to Wal Mart and Target using more inclusive language in their advertising like “Happy Holidays.” It’s worth noting that Fox News was selling “Holiday” merch on their website at the time of the declaration of war.
Christians have never owned Christmas. Most of the Christmas season has always meant many different things to different people. We can encourage people to remember the “reason” for the season, but this time of the year has mostly been about many other things besides the birth of Christ. It would be way more productive to focus on the faith, hope, joy and peace of Advent than to try to protect the sanctity of Christmas which has never been all that sacred.
I have never met a non-Christian that is out to “destroy” Christmas except for some that are opposed to the commercialism and consumerism of the day.
Let people celebrate things in the way they want to. I’m sitting here right now on Christmas Eve determined to not do much of anything today. Presents are all bought, plans are made and I’ll probably not go anywhere or do anything if I can help it today. I don’t say “Merry Christmas” anymore mostly because people are trying to make me say it. They say Merry Christmas and then look at me — I just say “Thanks!”
There are all kinds of beautiful celebrations that surround Christmas, like Winter Solstice and Hanukah, but also lots of Christian days that have significance. We miss the joy, peace and hope of the season trying to force everyone to say that same thing and believe exactly like we do. Very soon the battles become about red cups at Starbucks and then people light trees on fire because they’re so sick of it all.
Some people have very serious depression during these times. Let’s abandon the imaginary war on Christmas that didn’t amount to much of anything in the first place. Let’s discover something about traditions we didn’t know about rather than protecting what we already do. Let’s reach out to someone that is struggling and just tell them we’re thinking about them.
If you want, join me in celebrating Christmas Eve as a pants free day. If that’s too extreme, maybe send me a note and tell me the unique way you enjoy the holidays. When someone mentions the War on Christmas, I probably won’t say anything, but I do, the question will probably be “Which one?”
Be where you are, be who you are,
Karl Forehand
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