ABC's Barbara Walters Slams White House Christmas Card for including Scripture

[K Frame]

When did this religion in Christmas thing start?

I don't know, but whomever is responsible should be crucified.

[Ben]

Ben Stein wrote this about Christmas a few years ago:

Herewith at this happy time of year, a few confessions from my beating heart:

I have no freaking clue who Nick and Jessica are. I see them on the cover of People and Us constantly when I am buying my dog biscuits and kitty litter. I often ask the checkers at the grocery stores. They never know who Nick and Jessica are either. Who are they? Will it change my life if I know who they are and why they have broken up? Why are they so important? I don't know who Lindsay Lohan is, either, and I do not care at all about Tom Cruise's wife.

Am I going to be called before a Senate committee and asked if I am a subversive? Maybe, but I just have no clue who Nick and Jessica are. Is this what it means to be no longer young. It's not so bad.

Next confession: I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was  Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu. If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him?

 I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we knew went to.

[Stand_watie]

Ben Stein wrote this about Christmas a few years ago:

Herewith at this happy time of year, a few confessions from my beating heart:

I have no freaking clue who Nick and Jessica are. I see them on the cover of People and Us constantly when I am buying my dog biscuits and kitty litter. I often ask the checkers at the grocery stores. They never know who Nick and Jessica are either. Who are they? Will it change my life if I know who they are and why they have broken up? Why are they so important? I don't know who Lindsay Lohan is, either, and I do not care at all about Tom Cruise's wife.

Am I going to be called before a Senate committee and asked if I am a subversive? Maybe, but I just have no clue who Nick and Jessica are. Is this what it means to be no longer young. It's not so bad.

Next confession: I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was  Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu. If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him?

 I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we knew went to.

Ben Stein is a guy I hope I run into in an airport someday, while we're both waiting on "layovers", I'd like to buy him a beverage in the airport lounge and listen to what he has to say. Like Michael Medved, he knows who his friends and enemies are...

Regarding Barbara, I would really like to see Mr. Garrison grasp her firmly by both ears, pull her face into spittle spattering range of his, and SCREAM the entire lyrics of "Merry Christmas" to her.

[HankB]

Ms. Walters would probably see some deepy offensive mutual religious intolerance when I send a Jewish friend a Christmas card, and he sends me a Hannukah card. Funny thing is, neither one of us is offended - we figure each one of us is wishing the other well from his own frame of reference, which makes the greetings more sincere.

Ms. Walters ought to heed the old saying that it's . . .

"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, rather than open your mouth and remove all doubt."

[Brad Johnson]

Reminds me of a comic I saw a longggggg time ago (can't remember the comic, but can't forget the bit).  He says Merry Christmas to a snobbed-up PC freak who lights into him about it.  She browbeats him mercilessly then asks, "So what do you have to say?"  The response is a pause, a smile, and a rousing, "Merry Effin' Christmas, B***h!"

Brad

[geronimotwo]

I think she's off the list now!

i think this is exactly the kind of publicity the white house capitalizes on. i even wonder if she got a kickback of some sort for reminding the evangelicals why they would throw their votes to President Bush. seems to me there was a video with pre-President Bush claiming he was "chosen by god", when he met with those leaders and they asked him why they should support him. so, a little gospel on the holiday card shouldn't surprise anyone.

ps. this topic has some of the best wit i've read in a while. says something about my reading habits i guess.

happy holidays!

[richyoung]

I thought Christmas was Latin for "stolen from the pagans"?

That was only the tree ...

Early Christianity in northern Europe adopted the tree as a way to make the pagans, who celebrated the winter solstice, feel welcome in Christianity. They missed by a couple of days, but it's not an accident that Christmas is celebrated at the time of the solstice. There's no historical documentation to suggest that Jesus was actually born on December 25th, and there?s a lot to suggest that he wasn't.

FAIL.

Of course, "everyone knows" that Christmas is celebrated in December to "co-opt a Pagan holiday".  Unfortunately, as often happens, what "everyone knows"...  IS WRONG.

From: http://www.churchyear.net/christmas.html

"Here is what happened: Second-century Latin Christians in Rome and North Africa tried to find the day in which Jesus died. By the time of Tertullian (d. AD 225) they had concluded that he died on Friday, March 25, AD 29 (incidentally, this is an impossibility, since March 25 in the year AD 29 was not a Friday). How does the day of Jesus' death relate to the day of his conception? It comes from the Jewish concept of the "integral age" of the great Jewish prophets. This is the notion that the prophets of Israel died on the same dates as their birth or conception. Therefore, if Jesus died on March 25, being a great prophet, he was also conceived that day. This means he was born nine months later on December 25th. The pseudo-(John)Chrysostomic work de solstitia et aequinoctia conceptionis et nativitatis nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae accepts the same calculation. St. Augustine mentions it as well. Also, there was a Jewish concept that the Messiah would be conceived around the time of Jewish Passover, and a March conception is certainly within the range of Jewish Passover. Thus early Christians had good reasons to choose December 25th as the date of Jesus' birth which had nothing to do with paganism. We still can't say for sure when Jesus was born, but the date of December 25th is based on faithful reasoning, not an infiltration of paganism into the Church. The Church celebrates Jesus' conception on March 25th, with the Solemnity of the Annunciation."

[K Frame]

"Friday, March 25, AD 29 (incidentally, this is an impossibility, since March 25 in the year AD 29 was not a Friday)."

Which calendar is that based on?

Roman/Julian, or the later Gregorian?

[Matthew Carberry]

"Friday, March 25, AD 29 (incidentally, this is an impossibility, since March 25 in the year AD 29 was not a Friday)."

Which calendar is that based on?

Roman/Julian, or the later Gregorian?

But the Julian calendar is non-migratory. 

[Perd Hapley]

I thought Christmas was Latin for "stolen from the pagans"?

What's pagan about it?  Arguably, the date and the tree might have a pagan influence.  But the other salient points are Christian.  Manger scenes, stars, Santa Claus (a fourth-century bishop), gifts...

[Matthew Carberry]

I thought Christmas was Latin for "stolen from the pagans"?

What's pagan about it?  Arguably, the date and the tree might have a pagan influence.  But the other salient points are Christian.  Manger scenes, stars, Santa Claus (a fourth-century bishop), gifts...

It's within spitting distance of the solstice, which, being a natural phenomenon recognized by all cultures for millenia, was obviously never noted by any monotheistic religions and such belongs solely to the pagans.

Thus "stolen".

[K Frame]

"Thus "stolen"."

You have cookies?

Where?

[Paddy]

You're all wrong.  It was the Grinch who stole Christmas.

[Manedwolf]

If you want to see one aspect of the current holiday customs' evolution, look up the history of greeting cards, which some entrepreneurs turned from something that didn't even exist into something that most everyone expects. It's actually rather interesting.

[Matthew Carberry]

"Thus "stolen"."

You have cookies?

Where?

In response, I will quote from my 2nd quarter, Kindergarten report card.

"Has sharing issues."

No cookies for you. 

[Perd Hapley]

It's within spitting distance of the solstice, which, being a natural phenomenon recognized by all cultures for millenia, was obviously never noted by any monotheistic religions and such belongs solely to the pagans.

Thus "stolen". 

Oh, naturally.  Everyone knows that those mean old religions like Christianity were only invented to oppose good, warm, fuzzy things like nature, feminism, etc.   

[De Selby]

I thought Christmas was Latin for "stolen from the pagans"?

What's pagan about it?  Arguably, the date and the tree might have a pagan influence.  But the other salient points are Christian.  Manger scenes, stars, Santa Claus (a fourth-century bishop), gifts...

It's within spitting distance of the solstice, which, being a natural phenomenon recognized by all cultures for millenia, was obviously never noted by any monotheistic religions and such belongs solely to the pagans.

Thus "stolen".

Good point.

It's like saying that the ten commandments were "stolen" from ancient Sumerian codes; as if the idea that you should not steal, kill, etc could not be shared between different peoples.

[Matthew Carberry]

Yep, to me, that kind of synchronicity points to a commonality of the human experience.

Linear "who had it firstest" is iffy when referring to things that were only occasionally written down in a world of oral history cultures.

[K Frame]

"Thus "stolen"."

You have cookies?

Where?

In response, I will quote from my 2nd quarter, Kindergarten report card.

"Has sharing issues."

No cookies for you. 

Geez. How... pedestrian.

My kindergarten report card, in part, read "Has organized the students into a socialist collective that continually questions the authority of the teacher at every step."

I was such a proletariat.

Then I discovered Reaganism, and I never looked back.

[Matthew Carberry]

"Thus "stolen"."

You have cookies?

Where?

In response, I will quote from my 2nd quarter, Kindergarten report card.

"Has sharing issues."

No cookies for you. 

Geez. How... pedestrian.

My kindergarten report card, in part, read "Has organized the students into a socialist collective that continually questions the authority of the teacher at every step."

I was such a proletariat.

Then I discovered Reaganism, and I never looked back.

Ahem, "pedestrian"?

I was too busy living the Libertarian ideal.  What my effort got me I kept.  I was free to focus my mind on creating, to follow my interests, and to eat paste.

Not the mindless dronery of central planning. 

[Paddy]

Then I discovered Reaganism, and I never looked back.

Oh, yeah, now I remember.  The 'trickle down voodoo economics' touted to save the middle class from 'gubmint', but instead wound up destroying the working middle class with HUGE tax breaks for the VERY WEALTHY and HUGE tax increases for everyone else earning a wage (by way of historic increases in the SS tax) and then the THEFT of those SS funds paid in by us boomers to transfer to the general fund and squandered?

That Reaganism?  {{shudder}}  You're right not to look back.

[richyoung]

Then I discovered Reaganism, and I never looked back.

Oh, yeah, now I remember.  The 'trickle down voodoo economics' touted to save the middle class from 'gubmint', but instead wound up destroying the working middle class with HUGE tax breaks for the VERY WEALTHY and HUGE tax increases for everyone else earning a wage (by way of historic increases in the SS tax) and then the THEFT of those SS funds paid in by us boomers to transfer to the general fund and squandered?

That Reaganism?  {{shudder}}  You're right not to look back.

Someone seems to have forgotten what branch of government has the power to tax and spend, and who controlled both houses of that branch while Reagan was President (of a different branch).

[seeker_two]

I wonder if she'll react the same way when Behar sends her a Hannukah card..... 

[Matthew Carberry]

I wonder if she'll react the same way when Behar sends her a Hannukah card..... 

That's different, the Jews are the oppressees.