Merry Christmas To You Too, David!
The ongoing efforts to purge “Christ” from “Christmas” and to replace this traditional Christian holiday with some lukewarm pablum of a national holiday loosely based upon traditional Christmas colours and symbols but not saying the actual “C” word has found a new co-conspirator in Barbados Underground. David’s new banner proudly proclaims “Season’s Greetings” in Christmas colours and symbols.
If David desires to wish our Muslim friends all the best as they celebrate Eid ul-Adha tomorrow, December 8th, then he should perhaps post an Islamic verse about helping the poor etc.. If he wishes to wish Happy Chanukkah to our Jewish friends, then he should consider doing so around December 22nd – and maybe put up a photo of the children playing the dreidel game (“Only with pretzels, of course – bubee can’t stand the children playing for pennies!” says one of my old friends).
And if David wants to wish Christians all the best of their religious holiday called Christmas, then he should do so instead of insulting them by communicating that the word “Christmas” is too foul or volatile to say aloud.
Last year I passed through Kolkata, India for the first time in the month of December and was amazed to hear “Away In A Manger” being played in the huge Spencer’s store – with the words “… little Lord Jesus lay down his sweet head” clearly audible. After seeing Jesus totally eradicated from British and American retail stores, I was fascinated to hear the Christmas hymn being played in a country where religion is like dynamite and people die every day because they are unlucky enough to walk down the wrong street while being of a certain religion and not another.
“You are playing Christmas hymns that say Jesus.” I said to one of the attendants.
“Yes, Sir. It is Christmas” was the reply.
Yes, indeed.
Robert