moo321 said:
I hate Christmas. For pete's sake, what does it even have to do with Jesus any more? It's basically a day where society guilt trips us into buying **** for our families in the hopes that they'll love and appreciate us. Oh, and it's not even Jesus birthday; they picked the day because there was already a Winter solstice and festival for Mithra.
Easter has more meaning in Christianity, if you ask me. Jesus' resurrection assures us that there is a better life after this. Although I hate that stupid pagan bunny and its fertility god eggs. :laugh:
It'll probably be different when I have kids, though. Probably nice to give them stuff/watch them go apeshit with how excited they are.
Any day you choose to celebrate the birth of Jesus is a good day in my book. I had a great time at Church on Christmas, worshiping God, singing Christmas hymns, being thankful for His generous love for me ....
I did notice among the "Christian" population in the stores there was a bad attitude amidst all the rush. Yelling, inconsiderateness. I stood in line next to own older couple, and the lady was really very nice and happened to say something jokingly about the slowness of the line and to my complete surprise, her husband out of the corner of his mouth said to me, "Bitch, bitch, bitch! Now you know what I go through. Never stops... etc. etc." Believe me, he was dead serious. Obviously, he didn't know how lucky he was to have this good-spirited woman to put up with his ugly attitude. lol
Where I did find lots of Christmas spirit was at the Christmas Eve party I attended, which by the way, was half Jews. Everyone exchanged "Merry Christmases" and no one was being politically correct. These Jews appreciated the joyousness of the season as reflected in the songs of Christmas, and they were not embarrassed to use Christmas words. One of them said, "We get the best of both worlds, Hanukkah and Christmas," referring to their parents mixed marriage.
As a Christian, I think it's up to me to be responsible for how my Christmas is. If I left it up to the commercial and nominally-Christian world, it would be a real bummer. And I'm glad they changed the meaning of the former holiday to be one with meaning for me, although I think that too many are still celebrating the pagan holiday even though the name's been changed. IMO, that's their loss.