Xref: utzoo soc.singles:12311 talk.religion.misc:3903 alt.flame:1090
Path: utzoo!hoptoad!ihnp4!gargoyle!oddjob!pooh
From: pooh@oddjob.UChicago.EDU (soggy and hard to light)
Newsgroups: soc.singles,talk.religion.misc,alt.flame
Subject: Re: Christmas parties
Message-ID: <14173@oddjob.UChicago.EDU>
Date: 28 Dec 87 13:44:35 GMT
References: <8712231623.AA24882@decwrl.dec.com> <1340@vaxwaller.UUCP>
Reply-To: pooh@oddjob.uchicago.edu.UUCP (soggy and hard to light)
Organization: The Wild, Chunky, Spunky Planet of Mary Lou Retton Clones
Lines: 48

In article <1340@vaxwaller.UUCP> chip@vaxwaller.UUCP (Chip Kozy) writes:
>
>	Although Christmas may have had its' roots in religion, it has
>become on of the most nonsecular holidays celebrated.

Sorry, Chip, but that won't wash.  Christmas IS a religious holiday,
through and through.  All the traditions that you feel have become
"nonreligious" because they're not in a church are still customs
that not everyone follows.

I grew up Jewish, for example.

Wreaths on the door?  Never heard of 'em.

Christmas tree?  Nope.

Carols?  Of any sort?  No.  We sung some Hanukkah songs,
sure, but never went around door to door singing them to anyone
else, or sang them at office parties, or heard them on the radio.

Gift giving?  First day of Hanukkah, although I suspect that
custom was borrowed from Christians to keep us kids from feeling
too bad.

Santa Claus?  Who's that?

No stockings, red and green were just two other colors, no
mistletoe (I never saw any until I was in college), and no
one cared if it snowed on Hanukkah.  No Rudolph the Red-Nosed
Reindeer.  We never sent out Christmas (OR Hanukkah) cards.

You see, these are still strange customs to me, and certainly
not SECULAR ones.  I have been exposed to them all my life,
but they have never been customs of ALL Americans, like Thanksgiving
and turkey.

They are so prevalent, unfortunately, that you THINK they have
become accepted by everyone and are hence nondenominational.  They
aren't.

Food for thought,
Pooh
       pooh@oddjob.uchicago.edu

Caesar: Pardon him, Theodotus: he is a barbarian, and
thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are
the laws of nature.
                        -- George Bernard Shaw