The War on Christmas

Some Christians dont’ like to hear it, but the truth is that Christmas is a subjective holiday in America. So many treat it as if it were the actual birthday of Jesus, and it wasn’t. December 25th has a long history of varied meanings, and it continues today. For some Christmas means Santa and presents, for others it’s about family togetherness and love, for others it’s about peace, for still some it’s about getting off of work, and for some of us it’s about celebrating God’s coming into the world as a little baby. So whenever I hear Christians talking about the so-called “war on Christmas” I tend to dismiss myself from the conversation. That’s not to say, however, that there is no war on Christmas. The war, however, was started by Jesus, not by the “liberal media.”

So many people think the real war is about removing any mention of Christ or Jesus or God from the Holiday. Of course, since the holiday is so subjective I tend not to get bothered by such trends, nor are they really anything new. For as long as I have been alive Christmas has been about more than Jesus. All those sweet Christmas specials on TV, they’re not about Jesus. They all end with some sappy sentimental reminder of love of neighbor, or the importance of family, or falling in love, or “Christmas miracles”. They have those warm, fuzzy, and generic meanings to them. Indeed the whole season is about these types of ideas, not really about Jesus. Christmas lights and Santa Clause, Christmas trees, and Christmas carols, the Holiday is largely an amalgamation of Christianity and North American clichés. I always love the holiday, and yet I recognize that it is often shallow in its meaningfulness.

Maybe most of us don’t remember it around this time of year, but the world is broken. Retail clerks are reminded on Dece.ber 26th, but many of us can soak in the generic holiday season and feel as if all things are right in the world, but they aren’t. And while many of us are enjoying the holiday with family others will be grieving this season (think of the poor sweet families in Newtown, CT this year).The generic warm fuziness of Christmas won’t heal those hurts, won’t fix those problems, won’t rescue our world. Christmas doesn’t make it all all right. There must be something more!

My dear friend Richard Clark wrote so beautifully about this in a piece for Christ and Pop Culture last week. This is the first Christmas that he and his mother will have without his father, who passed away this year. I remember those feelings well, they still linger. I think of friends who’ve lost children, and spouses, and what the holidays mean for them. It’s easy for so many of us to think of the Holiday in rosy terms, but for some it is the most difficult time of the year. Christmas isn’t the answer, despite what our culture wants to suggest.

There is a war on Christmas, but it was launched by Jesus over 2000 years ago. It is a war to undue the wishful thinking of Christmas miracles that save us and save our world. There is only one miracle that can save us and though it began with the birth of the Son of God it does not stop there. We need the perfect life, and the cruel death, and the miraculous resurrection of Jesus. The war on Christmas is to undermine the sentimentality of the holiday, which often permeates more than just North American Christmas. It permeates our daily talk-shows, books, and most ardent cultural hopes. Jesus is more than and better than such sappiness. He is a warrior and he has come to the battle bloodied, beaten, and yet victorious. Christmas can’t save you, but Christ can!