"Christmas Lites"

(Note: The following was added as a comment to the previous post; it's so good it has to have its very own post. Thanks, Guest Blogger! You will remain anonymous unless you choose to reveal yourself!)

Late October -- pumpkins, corn stalks, leaves turning colors, of course, it must be... Christmas! Well, not Christmas, Christmas is gone, now it's "The Holidays". Whatever happened to Christmas? For that matter, whatever happened to Thanksgiving? Holiday decorations go on sale by Halloween. What's more, I notice that many of my neighbors now put up as many Halloween lights and decorations as they do for "The Holidays", only the color changes from orange to red or green or white.

Our paper carrier included a card with the newspaper, wishing us the warmest generic holiday greetings on November 19th, one week before Thanksgiving. As best I can tell, that card is celebrating snow and sleighs. The city parks are decorated in October with lights which are conceptually removed from Christmas; they depict French Horns, teddy bears, drums, packages, trees, snowflakes, and bells. These are lit nightly starting in early November which temporally removes them from the actual event of Christmas as well.

At work, my company has a "Holiday Gift Giving Program" for charity which used to be the Christmas Giving Tree, and a "Holiday Food Day", formerly known as an office Christmas Party. As an aside, those Christmas parties of old also featured (brace yourself) raw beef! We also said "Merry Christmas", and some people smoked cigarettes right there in front of everyone. This renaming is insidious; are we so afraid of offending the non-Christians in our midst that we feel compelled to wash out our own most significant religious holidays? I won't participate in these activities this year, they celebrate NOTHING.

Maybe it's just a sign of our culture overall. The world of "lite" mayonnaise, half the carbs, half the fat, half the calories, washed down with half-caff coffee or Light Beer. These decorations, parties, and lights are part of the trend toward "Christmas Lite". The charitable activities are in the secular name of honorable humanistic intentions, atheistic or at least agnostic, void of God and Christ. It publicly acknowledges the season, but it removes all the meaning of Christmas or Jesus.

Some might wonder what's wrong with starting the season early, supplanting the word Christmas with Holidays, or commercializing Santa? Starting the holidays earlier eliminates the true Christmas season. It skips Advent - a time of waiting and preparation. It lumps the secular and sometimes suspect Halloween with Thanksgiving and Christmas, attempting to give them equal and secular significance. As far as the semantics, the words help convey the meaning, it's that simple. "Holidays" used in this manner is tepid and I can't stand it, either it's Christmas or it isn't. Santa is Saint Nicholas, typically depicted as avuncular, smiling, warm, downright holy - a symbol easily tied to the religious aspects of Christmas. But your post points out something more. First the Santa image started getting homelier and usually is accompanied by that grating, cloying electronic "music" that plays repeatedly via motion sensor. But now the image of Santa isn't just luke-warm and washed out, it's being reversed into the nasty grin of the Grinch, not merely washing away the religion but replacing it with an evil twist.

This isn't exactly the Christians being thrown to the lions, but it is a case of letting a small group of atheists push us around the town square a bit. I think the gift-giving aspect of Christmas has also added to the commercial tone (Hey, throw a Santa hat on a Grinch if it sells a DVD or two - we need sales, this season makes or breaks us!). But instead of being cheerful or uplifting, this can mock the real joy behind Christmas in a way that's depressingly hollow. But none of that can stop you from finding a minute to light a candle, to say a prayer and thank God for the beginning of a life that affects and saves ours. Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas. I know I will, at home and at Mass, with a Nativity set, a Christmas tree, St. Nick, and family and friends.

UPDATE: The guest blogger says I can reveal his identity: It's my husband (which I knew immediately, but since he didn't add his initials to the end of the post, I respected his anonymity.)