The other day I heard this jingle on the radio:
We wish you a happy holiday
We wish you a happy holiday
We wish you a happy holiday
And a happy new year.
I thought it sounded absurd. Almost as ridiculous as calling a Christmas tree a “Holiday” tree.
Besides, if we’re going to change some words in “We Wish You a Merry Christmas,” let’s change the line about “figgie pudding.” I don’t think most people know what it is and I’m not sure I want anybody bringing me some.
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So Christians are boycotting certain businesses depending on what kind of signs they have hanging out in front of their stores. A boycott has always been an effective means of applying pressure to those who won’t say what we want them to about our God. Didn’t the Romans use it against the Christian and Jewish merchants who refused to hang a banner in front of their store that said, “Caesar is Lord.”
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My 5 year old thought it was “pretty pudding”. That sounds more appetizing.
How about boycotting anything Jewish, since Judaism doesn’t accept Christ either? Oh wait, that would do away with our “matzo” bread in communion. Doh!!
Just another issue in a long line of them that make people feel better about themselves, aren?t I really standing up for Jesus, while we go further into debt because everyone knows Jesus was a capitalist.
This is easy holiness because it doesn?t require anything of me, it just requires Wal-Mart to change. Something has been lost in all of this.
What bothers me is how we have lost the battle over Santa Claus. I rote an article about the history of St Nicholas on my blog. Basically, we have gone from revering him as an example of Christian charity to reviling him as a symbol of greed and materialism. I think it’s time we take back Santa and remember the legacy of Nicholas.
If by boycott you mean rounding them up and killing them, then…yes…I suppose the Romans did boycott the Christian and Jewish merchants.
Christian boycotts…. Sigh…. Remember when the Baptists did that to Disney a few years ago. That worked really well, until all the good, old boys realized that Disney owned ABC, and boycotting them meant no Monday Night Football. That’s when the boycott ended.
This jingle you refer to was a Honda commercial.
Like they really care about our holidays, and not about selling more cars.
I just hate the hoopla. I had a Christmas card that said “Happy Holidays” on the front and I hesitated to mail it….I hate being a pawn in a commercial endeavor!
Then again, a ‘Christmas Tree’ really has nothing to do with Christmas anyway so for me I say, “big deal let ’em call it a holiday tree.” While I’m at it, Christmas is only a holiday because Bishop Liberius of Rome in AD 354 decreed the holiday so, as an alternative to the Pagan “Feast of Saturnalia.” This season I met a few seminary profs who don’t celebrate ‘Christmas’ because there was no precident set forth in either scripture, apostolic leadership, or church history following Christ to institute it as even being appropriate; until a Catholic Bishop decided to create it.
But when it comes down to it I have to say that anything that sets our minds on God like a specific day carved out to honor Him, can’t be bad. Especially since it gives people a sense of community and a spirit of unselfishness, hopefully they get addicted to it and have their eyes opened.
If people believe that boycotting will serve the right purpose, then they should do it boldly and without hesitation. I do care when people tell *me* what *I* should boycott. It also annoys me when folks jump on boycott bandwagons like sheep.
Personally, I don’t believe merchants will affect the way people view Christmas by calling it a different name — one way or the other. People that want to celebrate Christ’s birth at this time will do so. People that don’t, won’t. Maybe I’m too shortsighted.
(Uhhm, I’m not sure what the Romans did to the Christian merchants fits in the definition of ‘boycott’.)
If it was the Honda commercial, then the actual thing they’re saying is “We wish you a happy Honda day”.
I don’t really care either way, seeing as “holiday” is just another derivative of “holy day” and Christmas lights have to do with candles and advent. No matter how they try to change Christmas, there’s not much they can do except not mention it at all. They can choose not to mention the reason for the holiday (oops…I said the “H” word) but it can’t stop me from doing so. In fact, it just means we have more reason to do so.
My church history is admittedly a little fuzzy, but I seem to remember reading somewhere that economic persecution (refusing to do business with Christians)was one of the major ways the Romans tried to force Christians to submit. There were notable outbreaks of violence against Christians during the time of some of the Caesars like Nero and Domitian, but they weren’t as frequent as we might think.
I’m sure there are some lurking grad students out there that can clear this up in a hurry :-).
I guess these comments relate more to the comments than the post, but… When I was a kid my older brother used to tell me when we had disagreements, “Tom, you’ve got to back your brothers play.” Well 1800 years ago (or so) leaders in the Christian church decided to take a day that had become a problem for the church and make it a day to focus on the birth of Christ. The Winter Solstice was basically a huge party, and it was a day that many Christians of the day fell back into their pagan roots.
That these Christian leaders were able to have such a profound affect on the culture of the day should leave us speechless, and humbled. What if the church today could do the same? I guess that I’ve decided to “Back my brothers play” on this one. I’m not saying we should embrace everything the holiday has become, I’m just saying that anytime we can get otherwise worldly people to think about Jesus it’s a good thing, and Christmas is quikly loosing that place in our culture. I think that’s a sad thing.
Tom
There was also another factor in deciding on the day of celebration. Yes, the Winter and Summer Solstice had become days of pagan revelry.
But the Church did something powerful. They began to celebrate the birth of John the Baptist on the Summer Solstice. They chose that day because it is the longest day of the year. After that day, the amount of daylight decreases. They thought this fit well with John’s idea: “I must decrease, so Jesus can increase.”
That led them straight to the Winter Solstice as the day of celebrating the birth of Jesus. It is the shortest day of the year. Every day after that has more and more light.
Last year in Alabama, my daughter’s elementary school had a “holiday” program, I guess they called it. They sang various songs. One of the first was by my daughter’s kindergarten class, when they sang, “Celebrate December Holidays” (to the music of “Celebrate Jesus Celebrate”.) I guess I just don’t understand the need to re-write existing Christmas songs like this. I was glad to see that they later sang real holiday songs, including a Christmas song, a Kwanza song and I think a Hannakuh song. That wasn’t offensive to me, but bad lyrics (like the ones in “Celebrate December Holidays”) was just uncalled for.