"How Christians have Secularized Christmas" 3 articles

[MarkCharles]

"Once various Christian extremist groups realized that their made-up "war on Christmas" would be a massively successful fundraiser, it was obvious that we (atheists) would be treated to hearing about battles in this war each and every year. While it is still not clear how (or if) atheists should participate in this "war," I do believe that Christians are largely managing to secularize Christmas all on their own with minimal involvement on our part.

"Then the Jewish community came forward and reminded us all that not everyone celebrates Christmas. They reminded us that the government has no business picking one holiday over the rest for special treatment. "What about Hanukkah?" they asked. They sought acknowledgment for their holiday and wanted their own symbols represented.

When some Christians objected to this, and others began to protest the use of "holiday" instead of "Christmas," it became clear that a real can of worms had been opened. As soon as Christians started to whine about "happy holidays" being anti-Christian, their real agenda became transparent. It is not about promoting tolerance or fostering plurality; it is about promoting their religion over all others."

MORE:

http://www.atheistrev.com/2008/12/how-christians-have-secularized.html

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"FFRF’s Winter Solstice sign returns to Wisconsin Capitol"

PHOTO at:

http://www.secularnewsdaily.com/2010/12/01/ffrf%E2%80%99s-winter-solstice-sign-returns-to-wisconsin-capitol/


"The Winter Solstice, the shortest and darkest day of the year, takes place Dec. 21. This natural holiday signals the return of the sun and the new year, and has been celebrated for millennia in the Northern Hemisphere with festivals of light, evergreens, feasts and gift exchanges.

"We nonbelievers don’t mind sharing the season with Christians," Gaylor added, "but we think there should be some acknowledgment that the Christians really ‘stole’ the trimmings of Christmas, and the sun-god myths, from pagans."


Dan Barker, Foundation co-president, said Christians tend to think "they own the month of December. We don’t agree. No month is free from pagan reverie!"

.............................................................................

"We Should Thank Christians For The Publicity !"

"I hate to admit it, but I'm beginning to think that us atheists should thank the right-wing fundamentalist christians for giving us more publicity than we could ever afford to buy. Consider the sign pictured above. The Dallas-Fort Worth Coalition of Reason (DFWCOR) scraped together a few thousand dollars to have these signs made and placed on buses in Fort Worth, Texas.

The signs were an effort to reach out to other atheists and skeptics, and let them know that even though they lived in the Bible Belt they weren't alone."...

"But that was before the christians got involved. Evidently the fundies, who were incensed by the limited bus signs, decided that the campaign needed a much wider distribution. They tried to organize a bus boycott (which mostly failed), hired a truck to follow the buses with a sign that said, "I still love you - God", and showed up at the transportation board meetings demanding the atheist signs be removed from the buses.

It was the intention of these christian bigots to snuff out the small atheist ad campaign, but it had exactly the opposite effect. The news media (and the blogs) got hold of the story, and all of a sudden the atheist ad was being seen and read by hundreds of thousands of people (if not millions) instead of the few thousand they were hoping to reach. And it made the fundie christians look like the intolerant jerks they really are."

http://jobsanger.blogspot.com/2010/12/we-should-thank-christians-for.html

[HopeHoops]

1. Christmas is just an extension of Thanksgiving.

Hell, it even starts before it now. "Jingle cash, Jingle cash, Jingle all the way. Walmart takes my MasterCard and Visa's for eBay..."

[rrneck]

2. They don't want to lose market share

and they have saturated their market. All of these various and sundry permutations of doctrine are efforts to trot out some "new and improved" Christianity to keep those butts in those pews. Unfortunately, they're clamoring for a growing share of a shrinking market.

Since religion is emotionally motivated, they have to deliver increasing emotional rewards to believers (who are just consumers of emotion) to keep the believers coming back. The result is religious extremism.

As the material wealth of religion increases in inverse proportion to its ability to deliver a satisfying emotional product, it will increasingly have to resort to force to hold market share. So far that's just been political shenanigans but they'd be burning people alive again if they thought they could get away with it.

[trotsky]

3. "No month is free from pagan reverie!"

LOL :thumbsup:

[rug]

4. This is a three year old article with a misleading headline.

[MarkCharles]

6. Which one of the THREE (3) articles, which are inter-related and referenced

by one other, are you referring to?

And why would it matter? Christian and Pagan holidays are eternal.

Why would it matter to Christians? They like to discuss something about 2000 years old all the time!

Did you confuse this forum with the "latest breaking news" forum?

[rug]

7. The first one.

Time to rotate the stock.

[MarkCharles]

8. Time to talk about topics relevant to the time of year. If people have a...

problem with discussing how Christians are constantly forcing their religion on the American society, or how they are constantly complaining that Christianity doesn't get top billing, perhaps you can tell us why.

We would all like to know why your choice of articles most often glorifies the churches, and seldom shows anything close to a thought more original than the 18th century.

Instead you are hiding behind radical religious right wing pseudo intellectual web publications like "First Things", a decidedly right wing web site, the intent of which is to slam Obama, slam atheists, and slams unions and worker's rights.

Here's a couple articles from that intellectually moribund and sexually hung-up publication you linked and quoted the other day.

"Natural Rights Trump Obamacare, or Should
Only the natural law can explain the deep wrongs of the recent health-care bill."

"Darkness Illuminated
Thursday, December 1, 2011, 10:58 AM
Mark Misulia
The porn industry is earning higher profits than the NFL, NBA, and MLB combined, and features as one of the most prevalent addictions in America"


Please explain why such a publication should merit the attention of the truly liberal posters at DU, whereas you think a discussion about Christians and how they see Christmas, on December 1,of any year, merits your cavalier, and rather snide remarks, "time to rotate the stock".

[rug]

9. Lol, you should see the things the NY Times runs.

You have too much time on your hands.

It's still a three year old article.

[Angry Dragon]

11. The Bible is almost 2000 years old, time to come out with a new one??

[beam me up scottie]

15. !

:rofl:

[qb]

5. The entire season has been so secularized I no longer care how people greet me.

"Merry Christmas", "Happy Hanukkah", "Happy Kwanzaa", "Happy Holidays", "Happy Solstice"

Thanks. You have a great day too!

[Angry Dragon]

10. Are Christians just closeted Pagans??

[MarkCharles]

12. I'm beginning to think so, they wanted to put some of their own icing on

a Pagan cake, and look what happened!!! People LOVED the icing, but rejected the cake.

[Angry Dragon]

13. I love icing

[rrneck]

14. Most people do

and they're willing to pay more for it