Freethinker Sunday Sermonette: well ex-CUSE ME!

We celebrate "chris"mas at my house too. When my son asked my why they call it "chrismas". I gave him an honest answer and the one that makes the most sense--especially in terms of the American spirit of this holiday..."It's named after Chris Kringle."

It's probably easier to consider a secular song for argument's sake. I sing Verdi's "La Donna e Mobile" because I love the song. Not because I believe that all women are easily led astray.

Sir,

I may not be alone in detecting a case of having your Thursday cake and eating it in David Aaronovitch's defence of yuletide-singing anti-Thorists (Comment, Dec 20) and accompanying letters. I find it hard to respect anyone who proclaims their anti-Thorism with missionary zeal, and then happily joins in saying such lines as "Yuletide blessings", however agreeable they may find the experience.

If you choose anti-Thorism you must surely have the courage and integrity to accept the consequences -- religious, cultural, social or otherwise ? or risk being labelled a hypocrite. The militant Christians who fought Viking religion under Catholicism here in Northern Europe inflicted some pretty appalling sufferings. But they did at least have the virtue of being principled -- you would not have found them using the term "Thursday", even if they thought no one was watching.

Sven Svensen Svenstad
Viking News Service
Oslo

I wonder what he would have said if you had started up with Kad Katan?

This is the difference the Bishop spoke of before Revere. There are those that would jam religion right straight up your tail and make you toe the ecumenical line. I sent this post to him this a.m. and his response was immediate.

Believe in part, whole or not. Let no man tell you what you should think or do in your beliefs. God is personal to each and every person....It isnt like being made in the Mafia in that you slip on the ring and all that come before you must bow and kiss it. Anyone who denigrates you for participation in fellowship should look inward. My equal in the local synagogue comes every year and he sings with his Cantors voice "Oh Holy Night" and its very touching and he does this out of respect for us and our religion. Then he launches into Channukah songs which arent bad either with that voice of his.

What more could Christ have ever wanted than for us all to respect and love one another? I have have read this post and it shames me as a Christian.

This always provides fodder for the fire of atheism as they can point and say, "See, I told you."

Oh, pish tosh. For me, singing along with christmas carols is the same as singing along with the Top 40 from my youth. I know all the words, and the songs evoke feelings from that time in my life...non of which are religious.

Christmas is a buffet, and I will pick and choose those elements that please me without feeling hypocritical, much like a Christian mining the bible for quotes that jibe with the Christian beliefs that're easiest to incorporate into their own lifestyle.

"Sven Svensen Svenstad"

Ooh, Thursday. Good one. It gives me a kick whenever I see Christians celebrating 'Holy Thursday' or 'Maundy Thursday' on a day named for a pagan deity. Apparently Christians lack the "courage and integrity to accept the consequences" when it comes to the vocabulary for the days of the week. There's Tiwesday, of course, a day when Christians have no problem celebrating Shrove Tuesday. Then there's Wodensday (Ash Wednesday, anyone?) and Frigday (when the Christians celebrate Good Friday they do so on a day that is the germanic equivalent of dies Veneris, the day of Venus. Wonder what 'frig' means).

I'll bet Jonathan Luxmoore also has no problem with the fact that Christians have long integrated classical learning and customs into their own culture, including, of course, their infamous theft of a certain December date for one of their own celebrations.

Et VLAM!!!

Revere, only absolute sincerity was called for in your reply. Loved it!

Happy New Year to you and keep up the good work!

What about Friday (named for Freya) or January (named for Janus)?

Actually all the "good" parts of christmas were appropriated from earlier religions as those first church fathers realized nobody was interested in taking part in religion that was all work and no fun.

I hope that idiot got coal in his stocking and spent the day in an empty cell in prayer and fasting.

We Scandinavians luckily never changed the name of this festival, so the non-believers among us can talk about celebrating "jul" without confusing the believers (too much).

On December 23, our dog Sisy Marine delivered 5 puppies. We decided to name them Santa, Noel, Jingle Bell, Reindeer and Frosty. I hope that Jonathan would not mind that we have extended to animal kingdom.

Goodness, from now on every day is Christmas. We decide to keep two poppies only, which two names you will recommend to keep?

Also, if you pass Phuket, please come to visit us.

I just find it hilarious that Christians, who follow a religion that sprouted up in mild Mediterranean climates, can sit around a pine tree decorated with icicles and frost, hang stockings over a fire, or burn a Yule log, all the while thinking these are "Christian" traditions, and anyone who celebrates this holiday without a nod to their deity is somehow impinging on their traditions. It's like it never occurs to these people that maybe, just maybe, icicles and cold wet stockings aren't going to play a very major role in Hebrew culture.

The only hypocrites are the Christians who accuse secularists of "hijacking" the festivities which their religion hijacked.

Sir,
I may not be alone in detecting a case of blatant hypocrisy in your Sunday Sermonette. I find it hard to respect anyone who proclaims their missionary Christian zeal, and then happily joins in worshipping their usurper God on the day reserved for the one true Sun God Mithra.

If you choose Christianity you must surely have the courage and integrity to obey all the commandments and worship YHWH on the Sabbath. To abandon the 4th commandment and use Mithra's day is to risk being labelled a hypocrite as they are implicitly worshipping Mithra by doing this. Was it not sufficient to usurp the Winter Solstice Feast.

The militant Christians who fought lions for Jesus experienced some pretty appalling sufferings. But their suffering was ridiculed the Romans won by secretly moving YHWH's day to Mithra's - and the Christians didn't even notice!

Yrs
Sean O'Fart
Catholic Catharses Service
Cork

Elf Eye: Frig's Day is for Frigga or Frija (both Norse goddesses - you can look them up in Wikipedia).

Kay: I have good friends who celebrate "Giftmas" - it's a commercial holiday, after all. They explain to small children that it's a holiday where advertising companies try to convince them to spend a lot of money, and virtue comes from resisiting this (by giving charity gifts, making gifts, etc).

As for us, we still follow the old Northern Traditions (that's the religion that Wes was referring to, referred to as Asatru by many these days, and more traditionally as Heathenry), and I still quite like Christmas as a secular holiday - although it doesn't fit in so well with Midsummer in the southern hemisphere here as it does with Jul in the north!

The religious people if they understand how the religion has flourished by inclusive of new traditions, they should have the wisdom of broad mind. Inclusive community building brings a better world, you see, a lively example. Jonathan was an example, he was a black angel.

Some atheists are devoid of inclusive community building practices and experiences. If Jonathan is half Kg, then they are 500 grams.

Having said the inclusive community, one area you have to exclude is the past evil history. Martin L. King's birthday as national holiday is symbolizing the excluding of past evil histroy of race discrimination. It has make the US a great country. Monumentous!

China is opposite. They even can not exclude the past evil history of Tienan-Men Square's Massacre, not mention to exclude the past evil history of killing people more than Hitler. A real contrast to watch.

This Jonathan Luxmoore fellow apparently considers his religious beliefs to be a burden.

He bears this burden all year long and thereby earns the right to celebrate Christmas, whereas we atheists get to have all the fun without the work. From that twisted point of view I can see why he would feel cheated.

Lay down your burden, Jonathan. You take your mythology too seriously.

There is nothing remotely "fun" about riding in a one-horse open sleigh. It is cold, wet, and nasty. And sometimes the horse farts, showering you with a fine mist of horseshit, which promptly freezes in your hair.

"Jingle Bells" is blatantly false, and anyone who sings it is a liar and a hypocrite.

On a less sarcastic note, I thought that Catholics regarded magic as heresy. Why then does Mr. Luxmoore regard Christian carols as spells or incantations capable of summoning supernatural beings?

If I say "bless you" when someone sneezes, how is that different from using theomancy to compel God to do my bidding? Isn't that the essence of witchcraft, Mr. Luxmoore?

We taught our kids that all stories, myths, religions, art, music, cultures, customs and anything else having to do with human beings belongs to all of us. It is, after all, our human story. So, we feel free to choose what resonates for us and to respect and enjoy the whole enchilada, so to speak. We see Lady Justice outside the Greek/Roman architecture of the courthouse the same way we would see a plaque of the ten commandments on the wall - all part of the historical picture. What anyone wants to believe about any of it is their personal business, but that doesn't give them exclusive ownership.

The militant atheists who fought religion under communism here in Eastern Europe inflicted some pretty appalling sufferings. But they did at least have the virtue of being principled -- you would not have found them singing carols, even if they thought no one was watching.

Yah... the militant atheists inflicted some pretty appalling sufferings, but at least they didn't sing Christmas carols. Okey dokey!!

By "principled" I think Jonathan Luxmoore really means "superstitious". He wants all the atheists to be as superstitious about things as he and the "militant atheists" he admires so much for their "principles" are. Looks like a classic case of projection.

He seemed to imply Atheism=Communism. Just a matter of time before Atheists are targeted as Homegrown Terrorists.
Better watch out, starting in February the DHS determines who can fly domestically.

Funny how he forgot the wars by Christian nations, one of which killed off a bunch of Jews and Gypsies (aqnd Communists), and let us not forget the Crusades fought by Christian Armies against Muslims. Oh wait, how about our own Manifest destiny that justified our wars of expansion as Gods will, fought against the heathen native Americans, and even the Mexicans who were Christians in the wrong color in order to expand our territory.

I recognize freedom of religion, if it makes you happy and a better citizen, all the good for you, but freedom from religion is also an inalienable right. Christmas has been so commercialized, it is celebrated worldwide, even in nations with miniscule Christian populations. It is now a secular holiday to many non-Christians and non-practicing Christians. I never did see Santa in a church, but I stopped going 40 years ago so maybe things have changed. Maybe Christians should have copyrighted or patented Christmas, if genes and seeds can be patented, why not.

As for Atheism, I can only say no one can really say for sure if there is or is not a God. If you believe, it is a matter of faith, if you chose not to believe, it is also a matter of faith. I don't have a clue, and until he starts talking to me like he does Pat Robertson, I guess I shall have to stay the course. The fact that he chooses to talk to Pat Robertson would be a cause for concern if it were true, but I suspect Pat drinks the same tainted cool aid as Bush.

In democratic Taiwan, they used to have a joke. You can not talk about independence, you just do it. ( De Facto) As for unifying with Communist China, yaya, you can talk, but just don't do it. ( 1,030 ballistic messiles aiming at Taiwan)

The mainstream of Taiwanese maintains the status quo, not excceeding the border. Because, Taiwan is under American domestic law called -Taiwan Act. It is not reasonable to involved with Americans to fight for Taiwan's independence. It is understandable and sort of wisdom.

There are things that both graceful religious believers and decent atheists do not need to talk, but just do them. And things that they can talk, but don't do them. Vice versa, sometimes, not always.

Let's see -- In order to instill their values in a pagan population, the early church fathers co-opted a pagan celebration.

Current church fathers think that converting pagans (including atheists) is one of their principal (and principled) god-given tasks. So much so that they encourage business establishments to "promote" their version of "their" holiday by the continuous playing of Christmas Carols as "music to shop by." Such music, it is thought, will get everybody, Xtian and pagan alike, into "the spirit of the season."

So, when an atheist, having supposedly been infected with said spirit according to the conversion strategy of the church fathers, sings a "music to shop by" song, (s)he is somehow being hypocritical?

As a previous commenter noted: "pish tosh"

Cthulhu will devour Christians and atheists alike in the end when the Elder Gods awaken so I wouldn't get hot and bothered over a Catholic priest blowing steam. He clearly lacks the sanity to grasp his insignificance in the cosmic order.

I just wanted to say that this is one of my favourite comments threads ever. Thank you, one and all, for this wonderful example of saturation-bombing contempt, so richly deserved.