War on Christmas

I have heard plenty about the war on Christmas, but I would say it comes down to the motives of the greeter. There is no way to be sure that a person or a corporation uses a certain greeting out of hatred. It may very well be out of respect.Personally I am happy to be greeted in any way that is synomous to the culture. If a person celebrates Hannukuh and wishes to include me in their joy or extend sincere wishes that my Hannukah be as joyful as theirs, it makes no difference to me whether I actually do celebrate Hannukah or not. Why should I feel insulted by a person who wishes me the happiness which they feel when contemplating and preparing for what is dearly valued by them?In this sense I do find people who complain about greetings to be silly. Some peeple will use anything at all as grounds for a complaint or a law suit. It is often impossible to please them. I heard about a rabbi recently who complained about the absence of a menorah in his town's holiday decor. The township removed all of the decorations completely, and he complained about the lack of spirit shown by the community.If this keeps up, I don't see why folks will stop at complaining about Christmas.Why not for that matter complain about hearing 'adieu' or 'adios'? Is it wrong for people to wish someone to go with God, if they don't even believe in God? Or is it flattering that the person is wishing you the highest blessing known to their culture?Go figure.

I don't make a habit out of defending Bush. But there is a point to be made; if God does exist then we as a nation ARE under God, whether we believe in Him or not. I do think that atheist are citizens, since there are no requirements that you must believe in God to enter our ports, or must subsequently abandon your own faith on arriving. Citizenship involves obeying Laws. Patriotism is a bit different. It involves espousing of an ideal. If a nation sets forth an ideal which must at some point be defended, only those who truly hold that ideal in their hearts can defend it without force.I have argued this point from another standpoint, that of Catholicism. Folks hate being threatened with excommunication. In reality there is no threat. We are all free to disagree with any law of the church, or any doctrine. But then we are not entirely in the church, are we? We have excommunicated ourselves, and the 'threat' is just a cautionary statement to those who are unaware of the implications of their decision.If you are a citizen, you are. Only an individual knows to what extent their patriotism goes. Not sure what you mean here. I am definitely aware of the references to God which you have mentioned above, and I have definitely spent some amount of my life dwelling on them. And I certainly have noticed the lack of correlation between the expressed 'christian' sentiments and the personal faith of our founding fathers.Let's just boil it down to this; I am Catholic, I live in a neighborhood almost entirely comprised of Orthodox Russians, Hassidic Jews, and Hindus. I have no desire to escape it or fear of being 'awash' with a predominate culture. Bigotry is only a state of mind, and I sense it comes from all sides. Perhaps Bush was right to say that atheists are not patriotic?Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

Ceratinly I will not cite you in future if I am capable of such misrepresentation.I am trying to interpret your disambiguation of Law and Morality. Perhaps my understanding of what you meant is flawed. my apologies.My point is that having citizenship does not automatically mean having patriotism, or following the law of the land does not force a person to admire the morality of a law.

If there is a god/s, we are under him/her/it/them. Is that better?
It has nothing to do with putting my foot anywhere, or with G. Bush. Hint; I never mentioned a constitution or any imaginary things rules, whatever they are. In this short little paragraph you have showed your lack of comprehension and ability to add things into the conversation in a moment of passion. OK, I said;"If a nation sets forth an ideal which must at some point be defended, only those who truly hold that ideal in their hearts can defend it without force."I am forced to think you are simply not understanding me. I will put it in new words for you; If a nation promotes a religion, and they ask you to fight in the name of that religion, would you do it?Would it be more patriotic to go war, or to refuse? It would probably be more noble to refuse, but I think patriotism implies loving the ideals of your country. Perhaps loving the potential of one's country is enough to qualify.I have no idea how this relates to genocide. Perhaps you would connect the dots? Since I expressly mentioned that our country has no rules of citizenship contigent on worship of any God, much less 'my' God, then it would be highly unlikely that I equivocated or even mentioned a stripping of citizenship. I said, again, that whether or not a person is a citizen, only they personally can determine if they are patrioticly inclined. It is totally possible to hate every aspect of this country and maintain citizenship, but probably not patriotism. Unless of course you feel patriotic about the purple mountains and fruited plains. I've been. I do not know what makes you think liberal northerners can't be bigoted. They just change their focus. First off, having a military record is not possible for everyone. I would like you to bear that in mind before you insult someone.
To answer your question, I never made any claim to patriotism nor any competition about who is more patriotic.If an athesit is bothered by the overly 'christian' aspects of this country, then maybe they will be left feeling a little less than patriotic about it all. Its personal.

Oh stop. Seriously now, christians complain because there's not enough christmas, atheists complain becuase there's too much. Christians think morality is decreasing, atheists think christians are forcing their laws on them.As to your oppression, well, I wish I could help. No one should feel oppressed around the holidays. Since I am not in a position at this time to be able to give you a break myself, I will remember your intention the next time I am in church....jk

Sir, with all respect, I think you are getting hot and bothered over two letters.Please look more carefully at Message 50."I DO think that atheists are citizens."And yes I did state it.

Dear RAZD,
I don't know if it would be fair to call person A OR person B better. Both of the examples describe people who have a belief and follow it as honestly as possible.I would say that person A is more patriotic and possibly a better citizen. That is because I define patriotism as supporting the ideals of the country, and if you support the ideals you will most likely follow the laws.There is still something to be said for person B. There are times when it takes an individual's views to make the country better. For example, Martin Luther King Jr. It is IMO an admirable thing also to adhere to a moral standard that you feel is important in spite of ANY constitution or declaration.

If a person is lucky enough to live in a country which upholds these values and if he is able to take the oath of office in good conscience, I can't conceive of any reason why he would subvert a nation to a relgious view.If a person is elected or ascends to a position where the laws he will be upholding deny the above values, he may be wise to refuse the office or yes, monstrosity of all monstrosities, take some steps to revising the institution.This country has always been about seperating church and state. There are a few elected officials who feel they must put personal views aside when it comes to things like abortion or cloning. If they choose to do otherwise our democratic system allows for the public to decide who will remain in office, and that no one person has the final say-so.As it goes, a belief system which follows graded absolutism proposes that we serve first, God, second, fellow man, and third, country. If we chose to take God out of the equation, then I would have to say that ANY constitution which does not embrace respect of fellow man is open to revision, and any personal views, religious or non, which DO embrace respect of fellow man, should be...not forced...but certainly upheld regardless of law. This is what MLK did. His views may not have been contradictory to the constitution, but he did point out the discrepencies in the values of this country and the personal values of the founding fathers. I don't think there are very many people who actually think Jesus was born on December 25. Even as a little girl I asked my mom 'how do we know'? Who cares? Things evolve. If people want to get all steamy about a 'war' that was over for the most part 1600 years ago, fine. Our laws currently allow for the practice of Saturnalia, Yule, Solstice, or none at all. I have been to Yule celebrations and I see no reason why they can not be celebrated as complimentary to each other.Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

Our laws allow for freedom to practice any religion without regulation. It does not say 'freedom from religion' but 'freedom of religion'. By law, Bush can BELIEVE and SPEAK whatever he wishes, but he can not enact any policy to enforce his belief. Did he?

Happens in English as well.Free of oppression.
Free from oppression.Similar, but in this case free 'from' oppression implies a past state of oppression.But if we say;'freedom of speech', or
'freedom from speech', the difference is too noticeable to interchange the words at random. If I am reading this right then yes, but if you take all mention of God away in every public situation, it is not allowing the same freedom to deists? Does that make sense? Like, atheism is winning as a world view because while we have the freedom to worship as we please, we can't talk about it openly anymore in politics? Probably, but then it is just a matter of perspective. The atheist will be free of hearing about christmas, but the christian will not be free to mention it. It's a lose lose, IMO.

Well, golly gee, I think you just put everyone out of business. Let Bushie say what he wants, let everyone else say Happy Holidays! and get over it!

Well, I am sorry. You never said person B. had to be American. Perhaps I don't care to. Maybe commiting treason is not the biggest crime in the world. If this answer is not a propo, then please
rephrase to be more specific. I don't keep track of other christians, sorry. I used the phrase because it made my point. It does now and you would perhaps remember that some christians don't celebrate Christmas at all, and that some celebrate it on January 7. If it will make you happy I will use that date henceforth. It is common knowledge that Christmas wasn't in December. It is interesting and all that good stuff to do the research, but still, who cares? I am sure Yule supplanted some previous celebration, and so on and so on. Things change. If some pagan converts began to incorporate their new beliefs into their old traditions ages ago, well then take it up with them. I think we, in this day and age, can share a date on the calender, especially since most of the earlier celebrations were about the solstice, and science has now proven that to occur on the 20 or 21 of the month on our current calendar. As far as I know the only time the catholic church forced anything was when Constantine made the Roman pagans give up their celebrations of Saturnalia, which did not involve Yule trees, etc.For the past countless many years no one has been forcing anything. The poor Romans didn't even get to keep any of their traditions the way the poor Germans got to keep their trees. I daresay they could have kept their gods to go along with them if they had wanted.

No sir. I said that if a particular atheist feels at odds with what he/she feels is the overly deistic nature of this country, that same person MAY not feel patriotic to the same degree as a deist does. They can still be an awesome citizen. I am Catholic. The views of our founding fathers regarding Catholicism don't inspire me with much fondness. I consider myself patriotic in the sense that I love the land, and I consider myself a decent law-abiding citizen. Since this is the case with me, I can't assume that other christians MUST feel more patriotic. This country happens to have pretty decent values. But again, if we talk about some other country where people are treated like crap, who cares about being patriotic? Isn't being a good person more of a priority? And how exactly does Christianity conflict with the ideals of liberty, justice, and equality? I think you are just furthering my point. Christmas is not scurrying to keep up with the calendar changes. It's been the same date since about the year 400. No, no, no. This is not going to become a one-size fits all argument. I said 'Who cares what day Christmas is celebrated on'? I think it is nice and cute and appropriate to celebrate it on the shortest day of the year (or close to, now) and short of knowing an exact date, a date with some symbolism attached is just fine. I do not know O'Riley personally. For all I know there could be a war on Christmas. I don't care how it started, but if someone doesn't want it here now, they are the perpetrators of THIS day and age. Yes. And I know how many Christians were executed by Christians just for not being 'heretics'.

Last I checked both deists and theists believe in God. A theist believes God interacts, a deist doesn't, but technically they are the same word. An atheist believes in no God. Perhaps you would like me to make a distinction as to how deists don't let God interfere in their government, so maybe the atheist won't mind deists. But deists including the founding fathers have been known to mention God publically. Still curious how the 'American values' are any different from Christian values. Please tell me what some of these other 'christian' values may be. I care about many things. Creating a stink about the 'injustice' of those who stole Yule is just not IMO as important as say the injustice of stealing land from the Native Americans. Things change, they can't all be rectified. A beneficiary of what? Being allowed to celebrate Christmas on a day which does not coincide with any other holiday? Haven't different religions always celebrated some simultaneous holidays anyway? Or does that just not count because they were all pagan?Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.

Technically they are the Greek and Latin equivalants of the same word Agreed. You don't think christians have been subject to going underground with their beliefs? Do you want to match holiday celebrations? Then we agree.