Cal Thomas as the voice of reason … at least on Christmas

December 15, 2005

I’m hard pressed to think of a single political issue where I agree with conservative writer Cal Thomas, but his point about the non-existent “war on Christmas” should be circulated far and wide, particularly in right-wing circles.

The effort by some cable TV hosts and ministers to force commercial establishments into wishing everyone a “Merry Christmas” might be more objectionable to the One who is the reason for the season than the “Happy Holidays” mantra required by some store managers.

I have never understood why so many Christians feel the need to see and hear “Merry Christmas” proclaimed to them at stores by people who may not believe its central message. While TV personalities, junk mail letters and some of the ordained bemoan the increasing secularization of culture; perhaps some teaching might be helpful from the One in whose behalf they claim to speak.

Jesus – the real one, not the Republican-conservative-Democrat-liberal one made in the image of today’s fractured political culture – said His kingdom is not of this world. Why, then, are so many who claim to speak for Him demanding that this earthly kingdom celebrate Him and His Kingdom?

Thomas, who helped Jerry Falwell create the Moral Majority in the early 1980s, is secure enough in his faith that he doesn’t feel threatened by a sales clerk at the mall who wishes him a “happy holidays.” He’ll celebrate the holiday and cherish its religious underpinnings whether the Target ad supplement in his newspaper uses the word “Christmas” or not.

Thomas even defended his perspective on Fox News on Tuesday, under pressure from Neil Cavuto.

Good for him. I doubt Thomas will persuade the Bill O’Reillys and John Gibsons of the world, but maybe his outlook on this will help convince a few conservatives that this silly crusade is terribly misguided.

Perhaps Bill O’Reilly and John Gibson et al should consider being the FIRST to offer a sales clerk the greeting “Merry Christmas”, thus cluing in the poor girl or guy of their preferences. I suspect this is, however, a courtesy they routinely forget to extend to such ‘lesser creatures’ until they have occassion to take offense at a “Happy Holidays” directed at them.

  • It’s time for these so-called Christians to open a Bible and actually read it. There is NO mention of Christmas or the date of jesus’ birth or any instruction on how, when or if it is to be celebrated. The apostles didn’t celebrate it. The truth, however, is exactly the opposite. Christians are warned not to participate in pagan rituals and observances – such as the winter solstice and the Saturnalia. One wonder how these “good Christians” overlooked this in their efforts to stir up more controversy, anger and bitterness. I think Jesus was against that sort of thing too.

  • The ironic thing behind this “war” is that Christians, in fashioning an image of persecution, use it to justify persecuting the rest of us who don’t follow their religion. And that’s what their demands are – persecution.

  • The really disgusting part of this so-called War on Christmas is that it is all about commercialism anyway. Bill O’Reilly has stated everyone should be grateful for Christ because they make so much money on Christmas. If that’s not hypocrisy, it’s blasphemy–take your pick. It is really nothing other than an effort by Fox News and the Right wing religious nuts to stir up another divisive controversy in the U.S. I like the response of those who merely scoff at the suggestion that there is a war on Christmas.

  • Cal’s right? Scary.

    I’ll go one further and say that real Christians should not be offended, but rather should be grateful, when those on the commercial side use secular references for the season. At its purest, Christianity separates the spiritual from the worldly, and I am hard-pressed to think of anything much more wordly than the commerical side of theis time of the year. I’d rather have those that seek to make profits this time of the year (and I am not claiming anything wrong with that per se ), using the generic holiday terms than wrapping themsleves around the manger, angels, or anything else that is considered holy about Christmas. Didn’t Jesus express his opinion on mixing money with the spiritual when he threw the moneychangers out of the temple a couple of millenia ago?

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