I was reading a post on a religious message board …
Uh oh, don’t some of my most rantish posts begin this way? I promise, this one isn’t so rantish. Well, I tried not to get too rantish. I even did some editing, I swear! :lol:
Anyway, I was reading this post within which a born again Christian was bemoaning how rich and full of deep meaning and spirituality Jewish holidays are compared to the Easter Bunny at the Resurrection and Santa Claus at Christ’s birth. It’s true that Jewish holidays do seem more solemn, spiritual, and deep, but Christian holidays used to also hold these very same values. If you want your holidays to have meaning, then make them mean something. Eschew the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus. Bring the spirituality and deep meaning of your scriptures into them. The only real difference between Jewish holidays and Christian ones is the Jews have, by and large, stuck to the old traditions and modern Christians have given in to the secular trappings. Christmas wasn’t always celebrated by a jolly fat man in a red suit and the exchanging of expensive trinkets. In fact, most of the things we now associate with Christmas are really recent inventions. It used to be a fast, followed by a feast, with many masses being given. Sounds pretty solemn and spiritual to me. So what happened? I guess the other stuff was more fun and tradition gave way to fashion. Even more interesting is that very early Christians weren’t all that concerned about Christ’s birth. No, they focused more on his resurrection at Easter.
So what about Easter? Was it always filled with bunnies and candy? Hell no. Once again, it was an extended fast followed by a feast and masses and scriptures being read, baptisms, the Eucharist (Communion), and the lighting of candles and fires. Yup, no hidden eggs or fluffy chicks to be found. It was all quite solemn, though joyful, and it resembled Passover in many ways. But now it’s all colored eggs, candy and baby animals. Rather pagan, wouldn’t you say? I would. Once again, Christians followed fashion rather than tradition, and now they cry about how hollow their holidays are?
And what about all those other Christian holidays? There are more than two! What about Lent, Advent, Epiphany? Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Twelfth Night? All of these are Christian holidays as well, and most of them were quite solemn, deep and meaningful in their original incarnations. Yet so few people pay them any mind anymore. Maybe solemn and meaningful is too boring?
The bottom line is this: If your religious holidays seem shallow and hollow to you, you have no one to blame but yourself. No one is forcing anyone to celebrate Christmas with Santa Clauses and wrapped presents. No one is forcing you to celebrate Easter with hopping bunnies and chocolate. If they are, then perhaps you are attending the wrong church. These holidays, and the others I listed, have deep spiritual meanings, and if that is what you want them to be, then do so! Remove the secular and fluffy modern manifestations from them and celebrate them in their truer form … and stop whining about how other religions’ holidays seem more meaningful. It isn’t their fault your own religion has fallen away from the old ways and allowed them to be co-opted by the masses as a secular parade of fun and gift-giving. Only you can bring meaning to your religion’s holidays. So take down the Santa in your front yard, don’t go into debt buying everyone you know the latest and greatest gadgets, and sit down with your family and a Bible and get deep and spiritual! There is a reason for the season, and it has nothing at all to do with any of the modern trappings of the holidays. Look into your scripture and your heart to find it.
Now that I have gotten that off my chest, I am sure someone will come along and inform me I am going to hell, minus the handbasket. I almost didn’t post this, but then I thought … “Why should I censor myself? I pay for this place! If they don’t like it, they don’t have to visit.” If anything I say offends you, then all I can say is … this place is not for you. Sorry. These aren’t the droids you are looking for. You can go about your business. Move along.
The question is, would you rather your religion be meaningful or popular? Christians chose popularity long ago and are being faced with the harsh reality that if they want the meaning back they’ll lose most of the free-ride lipservice worshippers who say they believe but don’t live it beyond that.
What about the fact that Christian holidays such as Christmas and Easter taken from the pagan celebrations of winter (yule) and fertility celebration (beltane)? These holidays were celebrated long before Christianity came along, and in order to appease the new converts, the Church conscripted these holidays into the new religion.
Personally, I think Christmas is more of an American/World holiday. I believe that in the pursuit of capitalism, it has lost most of its religious content. And Easter is rapidly approaching the same route Christmas has taken.
Your suggestions have about the same chance as getting people to read the Constitution and behave as good Americans. Bunnies and santas are convenient outs when it comes to kids, with the real intent of conditioning us to grow into fearful, greedy adults, ready for divide-and-conquer manipulation by the oligarchy. Our true faith is technology, augmented by a mindless, perverted form of Calvinist workaholism and easy credit. Besides, we’re all going to live forever anyway, aren’t we? So who needs that old style stuff?
Yup, popularity. Christmas and Easter were lost when they became national holidays. No matter what religion they are, most people don’t have to work on Xmas. Everywhere you go, people are giving each other gifts. Before you know it, everyone wants to celebrate Christmas, and so they do … because as it is now, it’s just one huge secular, national holiday featuring “great new products” that are “all on sale”. Do you see the whole country taking any days off for any Jewish holidays? Notice how you don’t really see a whole lot of mass marketing for Jewish holiday stuff? If Hanukkah had been made a national holiday at the same time Christmas was, I think we’d see it being just as commercial and just as secular and non-meaningful (for most people) as Christmas has become.
It’s just irritating that so many Christians want everyone to say Merry Xmas, and they insist there is a war on Xmas, yet how many of those very same people go out and spend tons of money buying lavish gifts, and decorate their houses in crazy ways, and follow all the other modern conventions of Xmas?
Do they even remember Advent? Right now, followers of Jesus should be praying, fasting, and being penitent … not running up credit card debt getting Aunt Sue that gold watch she wants and having parties.
I see it in my own family. They used to be far more religious, and the holidays actually held meaning. Now it’s just one big stress-fest about presents and food. It makes me angry, because religious holidays do still hold some meaning for me. For example, I didn’t have Santa Claus. I had St. Nick, the real saint, who really did good things for poor people … not some chubby guy who gives presents to everyone, whether they have been good or bad. Has anyone NOT gotten a present, because they have been bad? I have. It was a life lesson. St. Nick isn’t NEARLY as nice as Santa Claus. :lol:
Oh well, this is turning into another rant. I better shut up now. I really am trying not to be offensive. :D
You see, I come from the opposite end. I am not christian and try to keep out of this celebration as much as possible. There are, however, invariably large numbers of people who try to talk me into joining in because it’s “Not really christian anymore”.
However, we both know that if I do they will inevitably try to push me into admitting I do believe their doctrine really because I joined in celebrating christmas.
No, thanks.
When I was a kid, Xmas seemed a lot more special, and people in general tried to be nicer to others and help others during the holidays. We did the church thing and I remember Advent and many of the other Christian events that seemed to be celebrated and talked about in church, but not really anywhere else. I grew up with Santa Claus and Xmas trees and presents, but some of my favorite things about Xmas were the TV shows that came out and we watched every year (and I still do), and putting up lights outside because it was one thing I did with my Dad.
Back then we didn’t really start thinking about Xmas until after Thanksgiving. Now I see Xmas stuff in the stores before Halloween and it really irks me. It’s all about the almighty dollar and everything is so commercialized now. We never heard of people waiting in line for days, trampling people, shooting people or robbing people for the latest toy or video game. I was excited when I got my Atari 2600, but we also did things other than just sit around and play video games, like roller skate, ride bicycles, etc. Parents nowadays seem to want something to keep their kids occupied so they don’t have to deal with them too much. My parents had money, but I never got a Power Wheels car like all the kids have to have now and they certainly wouldn’t have spent $300-$600 on me for a video game console or anything else for that matter.
It used to be that people were at least a little bit nicer during Xmas than the rest of the year. But as I get older, I see less and less of that and more rudeness. I’ve gotten so disgusted with all of it that some years I don’t even bother putting up lights or a Xmas tree. It all seems to be more about how much money you spend. But the money isn’t getting spent on the people who could use it the most. Generally it’s getting spent on spoiled kids who have to have the latest thing and their parents want to make sure everyone knows they were able to get their kid the latest toy. And several weeks later, they will have lost interest in it anyhow, if it isn’t broken by then.
Nowadays I tend to lean towards Buddhism more anyhow. I think it makes me more tolerant of how other people practice their choice of religion and doesn’t make me feel like a hypocrite. Besides, all those expensive presents and gifts are never going to make people any happier. This year, I’m not even really celebrating Xmas. I’m not giving my usual gifts (2 or 3 people might get lucky and get some knitted gifts), I’ve told family not to worry about sending gifts, I am not putting up a tree, lights, or any other decorations. I’m going to celebrate less stress because of it. I’ll talk to my family on the phone like we always do, and I’ll send out holiday cards to my friends and family. And I think I’ll go volunteer somewhere helping out a family that needs help, food or gifts for their children because I feel that is the Buddhist thing to do: to help others.
In the diversified circle of our family we celebrate life in many ways. Some according to the different cultural backgrounds of individual family members. For instance;
We celebrate New Year in the way of my Mongolian son in laws family which is the
Chinese New Year, lots of shared Chinese/Mongolian food of every kind, as well as entertainment in the form of old world traditional Chinese/Mongolian native dances, and songs. Their culture contains many aspects that are very similar to Native American ways, but it is still an educational event for those of us from outside the culture.
Easter although very commercialized is a celebration we all come together for the sake of family ties, but one we celebrate much in the same way of traditional Mexican, Chinese, and Native American celebrations. We do have an Easter Egg hunt for all the children. Each family pays homage to their individual Religious beliefs.
Christmas is a family gathering that is a combination of our various cultural backgrounds as well. We have de-commercialized our family celebration by combining a Chinese Christmas and Native American system of gift giving. We place a limit on gifts ($20-$30), the women buy women gifts, the men buy men gifts. They are then placed in a communal pile and we draw numbers to obtain the order in which we will pick gifts. In the process with each turn there is a chance to take/trade gifts from their owners if so desired. When the owner loses a gift he has the option to take/trade from another. This can only happen with each gift two times only then until the gift becomes off limits. Although most Native Americans do not celebrate Christmas per say they are in the habit of trading among each other throughout the year, much in the way Orb and I did an Indian Trade on the Pecans and soap.
We all have our individual religious beliefs, but we don’t allow our cultural differences interfere with our family ties, and we are beyond the commercialized aspect that big business would like for us to be a part of. I do admit when it comes to the children we do indulge them somewhat in some commercialized aspects because of the peer pressure that is placed upon them as the result of attending public schools. It is a very controlled process all the same. It has been our experience that it far more important for them to respect their cultural backgrounds and as they mature they do so without contempt.
With my Mongolian grand children they have a heritage combination of Mongolian, Native American, and a long line of Texan that dates back before the Alamo. Rather than confuse them with having to adhere to one or the other we have found it more practical to combine our cultures so they know that there does not have to be a conflict of interest due to differences of religion, cultural backgrounds, nor heritage. In this way they learn that in family ties there is no need for the commercialism of our individual beliefs.
Merry Xmas and Kudos to Austin native Drew Brees and the New Orleans Saints for their Victory over the Dallas Cowboys.