I’d rather celebrate Christmas simply

Social sentiment against Christians soared to its most extreme levels under the Obama administration.  During the years 2015 and 2016, we began to hear claims more and more that Christians are “haters.”  Christians were roundly blasted on the national stage for “hating” homosexuals and progress.

This got to the point where many Christian believers had “gone underground” and no longer expressed their belief publicly.  To do so had become dangerous, even expensive, especially if a Christian felt it necessary to refuse business on the grounds of their faith.

Jonathan van Maren gave a very accurate account of the nature of this persecution on LifeSite News:

When I wrote in my column last week that many Christians voted for the Trump-Pence ticket because they felt that their communities were being threatened by the steady erosion of religious liberty under the Obama Administration, my assertion triggered a wave of emails, Facebook messages, and tweets accusing me of lying. Christians are not being targeted, my critics informed me, and it is ridiculous to say so.

Obviously, to a lot of these critics that the family businesses of Christians are being shut down does not merit the description of a “threat,” because they think that this is no big deal. Those Christians are hateful homophobes, after all, and “religious liberty” is just a fancy label for “bigotry.” Others seem to think I was overstating my case, and that such things rarely, if ever happen. Still others apparently believe that while we are obliged to listen to any number of identity groups when they claim to feel threatened or targeted, Christian claims are somehow invalid, or don’t count. Some even tried to racialize the issue, suggesting that the case I made about Christian beliefs was white privilege, or whatever – even though there is no such thing as “white Christian” beliefs.

The attack on traditional values and Christianity is certainly nothing new.  Christianity has been by far the most persecuted faith group in the history of the world, with one account maintaining that over 70 million Christians were martyred in the 20th century alone. Many of us remember the stories of Orthodox Christians sent to the Gulag to die in the freezing cold of Siberia.  Hitler’s Holocaust involved six million Jews, but he also is responsible for the deaths of at least five million non-Jewish people, and many of those were Christian believers, most notably leaders of Christian groups, such as pastors in Protestant groups, or Roman Catholic or Orthodox priests.

Surely, we say, this cannot happen again, not to us.  We have learned not to be so brutal.

But have we really changed?

Karl Marx wrote that religion was the opiate of the masses. President Obama apparently agreed:

…And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

As President, he stood silently by as the Muslim Brotherhood slaughtered Christians and burned Churches and businesses owned by Christians, but conveniently discontinued aid for Egypt when the military threw Morsi out and re-established fair treatment for this minority group. We could go on and on. But, let’s not.

Now we are in the Trump era, and with The Donald as President, many of us are profoundly refreshed to listen to and watch the First Family’s enthusiastic embrace of traditional values, including saying “Merry Christmas” in public venues like stores and so on.

Marxism did not die with the Communist regimes.  It just got smarter.

In a nation like the USA, almost none of us would wish death on, or try to kill, someone because they are different. Don’t believe the media hype on this – just ask your friends and neighbors what they think.  Ask yourself.

But while Christianity will not be persecuted with guns and concentration camps in the USA, the anti-Christian forces have other weapons, ideally made for people just like us.  Look again at the van Maren quote.  He summed the situation up in this remark:

…others apparently believe that while we are obliged to listen to any number of identity groups when they claim to feel threatened or targeted, Christian claims are somehow invalid, or don’t count.

This hits the nail right on the head.  Sure, you’re a Christian, that’s cool.  But what you believe has nothing to DO with anything.  Why?  Because Christianity is old-fashioned. It is for old people and not for modern, educated people.  

This theme is what shows in this Newsweek piece, timed just in time for the Christmas season, where the writer throws the believers under the bus again just because, well, being traditional is delusional in the author’s view:

Those bemoaning the “War on Christmas” hearken back to a mythical past in which our nation all came together to celebrate the holiday in the same way. I’ve got bad news for these folks: those times never existed.

Now, the author of the Newsweek article may be technically correct in his history.  But what is the point?  To celebrate diversity? Or to celebrate the Birth of Christ, or at least a season of the year guided by the remembrance of this event in some way?

This author does remember the traditional way things were done.  When Christmas-time came around we did not worry if the people we wished “merry Christmas” to were believers or not.  And they did not take offense to this greeting.  Rarely someone might say, with a smile, “Oh, thank you, but you see, I am Jewish…” or some other faith, or none. But this was the exception.

We really never thought of such a greeting as “religious persecution”, much less bigotry.  In fact, wishing people well during the season was something most of us really enjoyed, because we started acting more compassionate, more human during this time.  After all, if we were not being good, then maybe Santa would not bring us something…

Even as adults, the impression of doing good for others, just because this is the season to especially do so, was a simple truth.

Sometimes keeping things simple is more joyous. Merry Christmas!