Home for the holidays and returning home for the holidays are not the same thing. This year, we are not staying home for Christmas. Instead, we are returning home to where we grew up in Illinois to see family and friends. The DRIVE in winter can be a challenge, but we have done it so many times over the nearly 40 years we he have lived in Virginia, that our car is on autopilot.
Continue reading “Home for the Holidays”
Cath and I are among the diminishing number of people who send out Christmas/Holiday cards. In our busy digital world, fewer people send them, and among the younger generations, it is almost nonexistent. That is just life today. Me? I still enjoy the annual “old fashioned” event of exchanging Holiday cards.
Continue reading “Holiday Cards”
Cath and I recently saw “A Christmas Carole” at Ford’s Theatre, our 12th year in a row. I always find it renewing and every year, a different character or part of the play touches me. Not just Scrooge, or Tiny Tim, or the Ghosts, but sometimes a minor character like Old Fezziwig stays with me and provides inspiration.
Continue reading “Old Fezziwig”
As a Christian, I’m sick of hearing about the War on Christmas. The war on Christmas has nothing to do with people from another religion or immigrants from another country. It has nothing to do with saying Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas. What’s it really about? Dollars. The war on Christmas is one waged by American Capitalism, something we all seemingly subscribe to.
While Bill O’ Reilly is credited with starting this crap almost two decades ago, the War on Christmas actually started over 350 years ago when one of the most organized American attacks on Christmas occurred in the 17th century. Who led this attack? What blasphemous organization? The Puritans. Yep, the Puritans banned celebrations of the holiday because it did not accord with their interpretation of the Bible. Let me say that again – they banned celebrations of Christmas, because it did not accord with their interpretation of the Bible. Seriously. In 1659, the Massachusetts Bay Colony enacted a law called “Penalty for Keeping Christmas”. The notion was that such “festivals as were superstitiously kept in other countries” were a “great dishonor of God and offense of others. Anyone found celebrating Christmas by failing to work, feasting, or any other way… shall pay for every such offense five shillings.” That’s right. You honored Christmas by working, not feasting and not celebrating in any other way. It’s too bad Bill wasn’t around in the 17th century. He could have put those Puritans in their place.
Saying “Happy Holidays” doesn’t denigrate a single Christian. It takes nothing away from the Birth of Jesus Christ. What does take away from celebrating the Birth of Jesus? What takes away from the sanctity of the season? What takes away from the message of Christ?
Excess. Too much of everything. Too many presents. Too many lights. Too much eating and drinking. Spending too much money on all of those things. There’s a big difference between the joy of celebrating the birth of Christ and a fat man in a red suit urging you to buy more presents, which most Americans, including Christians, seem to go along with. Nothing quite says Christmas like fighting with another shopper over the last available “cool” toy for this year.
I’m American and I subscribe to capitalism, but capitalism is ruining Christmas. When stores have Christmas decorations up before Halloween, when those same stores have a combination of Christian and secular Christmas music playing NONSTOP starting in early November, when the biggest shopping days of the year occur right after Thanksgiving on Black Friday, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday something is wrong. And by the way, all of those stores cater to what they think we are going to buy the most of and what they believe they are going to make the most profit from. It’s pretty simple. Money rules, and most Americans, whether Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Atheist, Agnostic, or some other religion seem to agree. We love spending money during the holidays.
If you are getting your religious advice and “good feelings” (or lack thereof) from Costco, Target, Starbucks or Walmart, perhaps you should reconsider your source. Maybe the War on Christmas is within yourself. Many so-called Christians buy into the whole capitalistic nature of our secular Christmas celebrations here in America, and you know what? That’s OK. But don’t blame Jews, or Muslims, or Immigrants, or Atheists, or Hollywood or Corporate America for the lack of support of a Christian Christmas holiday. Instead, look in the mirror. Are you doing anything that actually has to do with the birth of Christ or his teachings? What are you doing to celebrate Christmas, besides buying your wife a new necklace (and maybe your mistress a new bracelet), your daughter a new iPhone, your son a new Xbox, bragging (or whining) about your end-of-year bonus and drinking with your friends? Maybe you are celebrating Christmas just like Representative Thomas Massie (R – Kentucky) by sending Christmas cards showing you and your family all packing heat and asking Santa for more ammo? That’s the Christmas spirit!
No one is hating on Christians and no one is hating on Christmas. The last time I checked, we still celebrate Christmas with a national holiday. I note there are no national holidays this year (or any year) for Hanukkah, Kwanza, Boxing Day, Diwali or even Festivus.
It’s time for people to take a pause, exhale and relax. How many of us still occasionally watch the Charlie Brown Christmas special? First released in 1965, it too wrestles with the dichotomy between the birth of Christ and the commercialization of Christmas. Is the show secular or Christian? Snoopy’s doghouse captured first prize in the Christmas decorating competition, but what most of us remember is the scene with Linus, as he quotes from the Gospel according to Luke:
And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
…
I think both the Gospel of Luke and Linus got it right – “On earth peace, good will toward men.” Aren’t those words we can all agree on?
With that, I wish all of you a Merry Christmas, and the happiest of Holiday Seasons. May you find peace, and practice good will toward others, no matter your religious beliefs, or the time of year.
Addendum:
It’s funny what sparks a memory. For me, the Christmas song Up on the Housetop, with it’s chorus of “Ho ho ho, who wouldn’t go, Up on the housetop, click, click, click, down through the chimney with good Saint Nick…”, instantly floods me with holiday memories from my youth. I fondly remember McKinley Grade School in Ottawa, and our Principal, Mr Powell.
‘Tis the season. Don’t we all really remember the Christmases from our childhood? I know I do. The Christmases at McKinley, on the southside of Ottawa, Illinois were special. We ALL remember them.
McKinley was originally a small two story wooden school house. Eventually, in the late fifties, it was replaced with a large, one story brick building. The new school included an indoor gymnasium, with a small elevated stage on one side. Both would figure prominently in the school’s Christmas celebrations.
Our excitement started sometime in early December. Christmas was approaching, which of course meant an upcoming break, and if we were lucky, the chance to go sledding, or maybe skating on the pond at Varland’s pasture. Almost as exciting was the Christmas Show the school presented, just before the break. The teachers told us about the upcoming show, and each class was assigned a song to sing. We stared practicing on a daily basis.
A large evergreen tree eventually arrived at the school and was placed prominently on one side of the gym. Of course, it needed decorating. Where did the ornaments come from? They were handmade by the students. Yes, there were the obligatory construction paper chains from the younger classes, but another source of ornaments proved a favorite memory for many. Milk, in individual glass bottles was delivered to school each day. Those bottles had blue or silver foil caps. We collected the caps and then made stars, ornaments, or strings of ornaments from them. Oh how they shined and sparkled in the reflected light on the tree.
The excitement grew, and a few days before our break, there were gift exchanges in each of the classrooms. The gifts weren’t big of course, but it was still fun and increased our anticipation.
As the date of the show approached, we kids practiced our songs. The week of the show, the entire school gathered in the gym a few times to practice, and also to sing “songs of the season” together. Those daytime sessions were great fun. All of the kids marched by class to the gymnasium, and then we’d sit on the floor facing the stage. Everyone was in a giddy mood with much laughter, yelling and barely contained excitement. Each class practiced their songs, but in between, Mr. Powell would lead the entire school in Christmas and Holiday songs. He stood in front of us near the tree, wearing a holiday bow tie. I think he was as excited as we were.
When leading the songs, he also acted some of them out. One example several friends remember was singing the song Up on the Housetop*. As the chorus was sung, Mr. Powell would stick his belly out and while placing both hands over his stomach, sing in his deep baritone “Ho ho ho, who wouldn’t go, ho ho ho, who wouldn’t go…”. When the next line “Up on the housetop, click, click, click, Down through the chimney with good Saint Nick” was sung, he clicked his fingers three times instead of actually singing “click, click, click.” Of course, all of us kids quickly caught on, and did the same thing – imagine a couple hundred kids all clicking in time with the chorus, and you get the picture.
The songs we sang at the time included both religious and secular Christmas songs. One student who is Jewish, remembered feeling special because we would inevitably sing one or two Hannukah songs. It was a simpler time.
Eventually, it was time to return to our classrooms, but the singing wasn’t quite over. Mr. Powell would start us singing an old English folk song Christmas is Coming, with the opening line “Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat…” The song is meant to be sung as a round, which is exactly what we did. I believe we were divided into thirds, with each group starting one line after the previous group started. Once we had sung “around” a couple of times, the classes were dismissed, one grade at a time, with each class singing the song all the way back to their classroom.
For the younger kids, there was often a bit of confusion on the lyrics. Instead of “…if you haven’t got a ha’penny, God bless you…”, they heard “if you haven’t got a hay penny God Bless a shoe…” What was a Hay Penny? Why were we blessing shoes? It could all be a bit confusing, but the fun and good spirits made up for it.
Finally it was the big day of the Christmas Show. It was also the day before Christmas break started. Excitement was at a fevered pitch.
The evening program was a bit more formal than our daytime singalongs. It wasn’t quite the Christmas Show from the movie Love Actually – McKinley School was a bit more primitive, but we did have a stage, and the adults sat on folding chairs set up on the gym floor itself. As kids, we dressed in our “good clothes” for the big night. Our parents brought treats and cookies for the classrooms.
While the adults found their seats in the gymnasium, we kids walked to our classrooms, waiting for our turn to sing. My friend Joy remembers sitting at her desk eating cookies and coloring (after smelling) the newly mimeographed Christmas pictures. For the younger grades, there were also games that some of the parents (moms) helped with in the classrooms. Everyone wanted to make sure we kids were entertained, focused and staying out of trouble.
Finally the show started, with the Kindergarten classes singing first. My friend Lynn remembers “The big curtain opening was our cue to start singing. It was quite intimidating to see all the people “out there” sitting on folding chairs looking at us. We sang Away in a Manger and the little stage seemed huge.”
One of the classes always sang Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree in German (Oh Tannenbaum, Oh Tannenbaum…). How cool was that? Singing a Christmas song from another country!
The show eventually ended and parents picked up their children from the classrooms. Cookies were finished, and newly colored Christmas pictures served as visual reminders of the fun that night. During the short drive home, we were still animated. I suppose the stimulation from doing the show, along with the sugar rush of the cookies combined and kept us amped up for awhile.
As with all things, time passed and the world changed – not for better or worse, but changed none-the-less. Mr Powell retired. The huge tree was replaced with two smaller artificial trees for fire safety. Eventually, the festivities changed from a secular Christmas celebration to a Holiday celebration, which was the right thing to do.
One teacher later reminisced “We teachers loved the singing almost more than you kids! We continued the tradition after Mr. Powell retired, but it was never quite the same.”
I’ve been gone from Ottawa for many years now, and to be honest, I don’t know if they have the Holiday celebration in the gym anymore. What I do know is I have wonderful memories from my youth that I wouldn’t trade for anything.
I’ll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams… Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat, Please put a penny in the old man’s hat…
Addendum:
Live Life Exuberantly 