Is There A War On Christmas?

Every December, liberals like me rankle under the accusation that we are waging a “War on Christmas.”  During his presidential campaign, for example, Donald Trump made it a major talking point, vowing to “make Christmas great again” and promising that "If I become president, we're going to be saying Merry Christmas at every store.”  He wasn’t the first.

Notorious anti-Semite Henry Ford raised the issue back in 1929 in a pamphlet he published titled The International Jew: The World’s Foremost Problem, complaining that “Last Christmas most people had a hard time finding Christmas cards that indicated in any way that Christmas commemorated Someone's Birth.”  Ford insinuated that Jews were secretly running the world, apparently oblivious to the fact that Jesus himself was of the very tribe he so despised.

Fast forward thirty years to 1959, when the ultra-right-wing John Birch Society warned of an “assault on Christmas” by United Nations fanatics who wanted department stores to replace baby Jesus with symbols of international cooperation and global peace.  (Heaven forbid!)

Now, in this digital age, the alleged “War on Christmas” is a predictable part of the blogosphere every holiday, as conservatives stir fears that sinister conspirators (Muslims, Democrats, secular humanists or the bogeyman de jour) want to rob Christians of their right to worship or express their beliefs in public.  When the clerk at Home Depot says “Happy Holidays” or your neighbor wishes you “Season’s Greetings” or the U.S. Postal Service releases a new December stamp featuring a glowing candle rather than a cross, commentators on Fox News automatically assume they are plotting to establish a secular republic that will stamp out God, ban the Bible and likely feed Sunday School teachers to the lions. What rubbish!

The truth is I love Christmas. In my experience, it was great long before the Donald came along.

I grew up singing “O Little Town of Bethlehem” and “Silent Night” in church on Christmas Eve, and in my opinion that is exactly where these songs and symbols belong: in church, not in a public school classroom and not in a creche erected on the town plaza.  Because much as I love Christmas, I also respect my neighbors who have other beliefs and other traditions than my own.  Whether Jewish or Muslim or non-religious, whether they celebrate Hanukkah, Yule, Kwanzaa or Bodhi Day, commemorating the Buddha’s enlightenment, they are all Americans and welcome in this spiritually diverse land where there is no official or established church, but where all are guaranteed the freedom to follow their own conscience in matters of faith.  

So instead of waging any kind of war or quarrelling over friendly salutations, how about toning down the rhetoric working together for a little more peace on earth this December, with good will for all?  Wish me Merry Christmas or Feliz Navidad or Joyeux Nöel if you like; I won’t take offense.  And on December 25th, attend the church or visit the Chinese restaurant of your choice.  

Jews Murdered in Pittsburgh Synagogue

Hate crimes against Jews are on the rise and, according to the Anti-Defamation League, attacks targeted at Jews accounted for half of all religiously inspired hate crimes in 2016. The eleven murdered at the Tree of Life Synagogue by an anti-Semite in Pittsburgh this weekend come on the heels of a pipe bomb mailed to Holocaust survivor George Soros (along with other prominent Democrats) from a Florida man known for sharing his anti-Jewish conspiracy theories online. This past spring, a self-described white nationalist openly calling for a United States "free of Jews" drew nearly 90,000 votes in the run up to California's statewide Republican primary, while an assortment of neo-Confederates, white supremacists, and other hate groups marched openly in Charlottesville last year chanting "Jews Will Not Replace Us."

This is becoming a nation that most of us not longer recognize, where vile ideologies once relegated to the shadows are making their way to the forefront of political rallies. We must not allow these distortions of American values to go unchallenged or further enter the mainstream. As our parent's and grandparent's generation fought the Nazis in Europe, we must continue to fight bigotry, racism and calls for ethnic purity in our own time, on our own soil. We must form coalitions and stand in solidarity with our Jewish sisters and brothers, with our GLBTQ sons and daughters, with blacks, with immigrants and every other minority that has become a scapegoat to channel the unfocused anger of an Empire in decline. For in this diverse land, whatever our faith or lack or faith, whatever our skin color, whatever our national heritage, we are all minorities and in danger therefore of becoming victims.  Tribalism must not triumph.  

In the famous words attributed to pastor Martin Neimoller, "In Germany, first they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.  Then they came for the Jews and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time, there was no one left to speak up." On this Reformation Sunday, we should remember and resemble this courageous Lutheran who was imprisoned at Dachau for his resistance to Hitler.

Speak up and act up. 

Rev. Gary Kowalski

Thoughts on Parkland on Palm Sunday

Love is stronger than death.  Tragedy will not have the last word in human history.  That, for Christians, sums up the meaning of Holy Week.

With Palm Sunday at hand, young people made a triumphal entry into Jerusalem (a.k.a. Washington, D.C.) this weekend, the seat of a corrupt, monied and brutal state, calling for an end to violence and bearing a message of idealism and hope.  The crowds (a.k.a.the national media) adored them, throwing palms and welcoming them with shouts of Hosanna.  

Meanwhile, Herod and Pilate knew who controlled the legions, and knew how easily the multitudes of voters could be distracted by other spectacles.  “What is truth?” asked jesting PIlate.  To him, it was all fake news.  

The chronology is not quite right.  That old story ended in crucifixion, in one man’s blameless blood being spilled.  This revised version began with the slaughter of innocents as seventeen students in Florida were gunned down by the fusillade of an AR-15.  The narratives agree in this much, however: for no good reason, there was a massacre, and the authorities treated it as business as usual.  

Jesus was executed as an enemy of the state: a threat to existing structures of power and privilege.  Crucifixion, in the Roman Empire, was a sentence reserved solely for the crime of sedition or inciting insurrection against the hegemony.  

The students who led rallies across America yesterday to ban assault-style weapons are likewise receiving death threats.  How many more will have to die before their demands for non-violent change are made effective?  With school shootings almost weekly, no one knows.  The answer is probably too many.  

We can take heart, though, in knowing that resistance is not futile.  The good news  of Easter is that goodness has power.  Decency and kindness may suffer temporary setbacks, may even seem to perish entirely, but will resurrect in the peoples’ struggles for justice and dreams of peace.  In the words of eighteen year old Parkland survivor Emma Gonzalez, “"if all our government and President can do is send thoughts and prayers, then it's time for victims to be the change that we need to see.”  

Didn’t same prophets who said the promised one would come riding on a colt also proclaim that the children would lead the way?