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Commentary - Sep 22, 2008 - Printable Version
- The Crèche and the Cross
by S. K. Eleton - Theocracy Watch
(This is the third article in the column Theocracy Watch. Column... still coming soon-ish.) Well, September is here. Children are back in school, and all the end of summer sales have turned into fall white sales. Bill O’Reilly is no doubt checking his to-do calendar, and noticing the entry “Begin yearly tirade about war on Christmas”. Meanwhile, the Christian warriors of the religious right are sharpening their swords, ready to go back to their foxholes (the kind without any atheists in them, of course) and fend off any and all attacks on their favorite holiday. City managers are planning and voting on whether to have just the crèche this year, or whether to include secular portions in the display, such as snowmen, reindeer, and Santa Claus, in the hopes that this will keep them within the letter of the law on unconstitutional entanglement with religion. Meanwhile, the courts haven’t even finished hearing arguments in the numerous legal challenges generated by last year’s activities.
In the courts, many cities are using a novel approach in defending themselves against challenges to the blatantly unconstitutional holiday displays they are erecting. The claim they are using is that all these crèches and all these crosses are “secular” symbols of our “shared heritage”, and that they have nothing to do with Christianity at all. There is only one word for this: HOGWASH. I know it’s hogwash, and they know it’s hogwash. Those out there who believe that the crèche and the cross are secular symbols that have nothing to do with Christianity, please raise your hand. Raise it high, and keep it up until I get all your names down – I have some swamp land somewhere in Arizona I would like to sell you. Although many courts and many journalists seem, at least superficially, to have accepted this “secular, historical” argument, it is nothing short of ludicrous to suggest that the crèche and the cross have any purpose other than symbolizing the birth and death of Jesus Christ, the official savior of the Christian religion. As such, these are religious symbols, and the placement of these symbols on public property is nothing short of an unconstitutional establishment of religion, and a particular religion, to boot.
Another tactic being used by some cities is the multicultural effort to include holiday symbols from other religions. Usually these are only erected following a complaint to the City Hall, after which you might, if the City Hall is tolerably generous, see menorahs alongside the crèche. In a couple of rare occasions, there have been Wicca pentacles, and at least in one town, a statue erected to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, created as a joke by the now-infamous Pastafarians. Although many of these symbols will pop up around the country, it is not unusual for the outraged “good American” Christians in the town to refuse to allow these “offensive” and “insulting” symbols to remain. Sometimes they challenge them legally. Sometimes they agree to move their own symbols off public property and onto private property where they belong, if the other religions will remove their blasphemous symbols. On some occasions, they simply take charge of the situation and remove all non-Christian symbols themselves, often in the middle of the night, so the town constabulary can present a relatively believable deniability in not witnessing the crime, and not arresting the perpetrators. Unfortunately, for constitutional purposes, simply allowing other religious groups to add their religious litter to the religious litter already spread over the public square is not really adequate, because the US Constitution does not allow the promotion of religion over non-religion, either. In recognition of this fact, the state capital in Madison, WI, allows an atheist group to erect a Winter Solstice sign every December, in order to protect it against lawsuits surrounding the overtly Christian Christmas tree that is ubiquitous throughout the season. This is, of course, treated as an outrage by the good citizens of Wisconsin, who demand every year that the disgusting sign be removed. I imagine their preference is that it be burned in the capital rotunda (perhaps along with the horrible sinners who were responsible for its presence).
One of the familiar weapons of the armies of God during the month of December is the familiar “Reason for the Season” paraphernalia. Buttons, magnets, bumper stickers, Christmas cards, signs, coffee mugs, and possibly even bobble-heads pop up everywhere, urging us to remember the real “Reason for the Season”. So, as a courtesy to all my Christian friends, I am going to do my part for Christmas cheer by reminding everyone of the real reason for the Christmas season. It is, as we all know, a story that stretches back into antiquity, approximately two millennia into antiquity, to be precise. It all began with the birth and death of a carpenter in Palestine known as Jesus, henceforth referred to by his Christian title, The Christ. Sometime in what is now referred to as the first century A.D., a new religion sprang up, a religion centered around The Christ, calling themselves Christians. In the Middle East at that time there were any number of competing religions, including the Pagan religions. The Pagans were mostly nature-worshippers, with various gods for the elements and also for the vegetation and the animals, and with any number of rituals to celebrate the sun and the seasons. One of these rituals was the Winter Solstice, which occurred on December 25 every year, to celebrate the lengthening of the day and the eventual coming of summer. It was for the most part a fertility festival, designed to encourage bumper crops in the fields the next year. The festivals that occurred at the time of the solstice were merry, with plenty of dancing, drinking, feasting, and also with trees and wreaths and gifts. A good time was had by all.
Meanwhile, Christianity was spreading throughout the empire, following the conversion of the Emperor Constantine, who was more than willing to spread his faith by force if necessary. Many of the citizens converted to the new religion, adopting the new beliefs without necessarily dropping their old customs. Many of the old rituals and festivals were simply incorporated right into the new religion, and people kept on doing what they had been doing every December 25, much to the dismay of the much more austere and stern Christian leaders. This was not acceptable, so something had to be done. The only problem was, it would be difficult to hold onto the new converts if they took away all the fun festivals, asking them to adopt an austere, aesthetic life style with the stern, forbidding rules embodied in the sacred texts. The people wanted a celebration, so Christianity would give them a celebration. Thus did the church eventually establish an official date for celebrating the birth of The Christ. No one really knew exactly when he had been born, so one day would do just as well as another. What day should we use? Well, maybe…hey, don’t you think December 25 might be a good day? Eventually, the calendar shifted, moving the actual solstice to December 21, but Christmas stayed on December 25, the date that it is still celebrated today. Over time, Christianity managed to co-opt many other symbols of the pagan religions, including the cross and the spire, neither of which are inherently part of the Christian religion. After all this time, few Christians are aware of the history of Christmas, and many devout believers accept it as the actual, true date of birth of The Christ, duly confirmed by his official birth certificate, notarized and filed in Bethlehem on December 25, 0001, perhaps signed by Herod himself.
This, then, is the reason for the season – the total demolition of competing religions. The actual reason is not the birth of a baby in Bethlehem 2000 years ago. The actual reason is not the death of a man in Jerusalem 33 years later. The true reason for the Christmas season was to co-opt the celebrations of a rival cult, and the destruction of all other gods and those who believed in them. That is still the real reason today. The message is plain – we are Christians, and we have beautiful, fun celebrations during one of the coldest, darkest months of the year. If by any chance you should try to have a celebration of your own at the same time for any reason, we will pout and cry and stomp our feet. If that doesn’t work, we’ll sic Bill O’Reilly on you, then you’ll really be sorry! Yes, there is a war on every holiday season – a war against all non-Christian forms of thought. The actual traditions and rituals of the Christmas season have evolved a great deal through the ages, but one thing remains constant – the reason for the season. All the crèches and the crosses, all the lights and the music, all the mistletoe and the trees, all carefully erected in government buildings and public schools, all stand in mute testimony to the determination of Christianity to triumph over all other philosophies of life by any means possible.
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