All is Nothing

Last year, at our organization's Christmas Holiday party, I noticed that, as usual, there was no sign of the actual Christmas story, no religious symbols, no manger scene, among all our decorations. When someone sorta mentioned it to the President of the Board, she declared that we were being "inclusive". We weren't just celebrating Christmas but all religions and all their celebrations.

I did not scoff out loud but I wanted to say that we were not celebrating any part of any religion whatsoever. There was no menorah, for example, despite that fact that we had a religious Jew present, and there were certainly Christians. Besides, apart from Christianity and Judaism, the "holiday season" has no religion that celebrates this time of year. (I am sure we could find some little religion somewhere that does.) If we were celebrating all the religious holidays of the holiday season, we would have had at least one manger scene and a menorah.

Even if you do not believe in the virgin birth of Christ (as both Christians and Muslims do), could you not at least have some acknowledgement of what Christmas means and what the menorah stands for? When I was in high school choir (in the 70's) we sang the sacred and secular songs for Christmas. One of our soloists, who was quite good, was glad to sing a sacred Christmas song despite the fact that he was not a Christian. When people asked why he would sing a sacred song, he simply said that he appreciated its meaning to those who do believe. What has happened to that attitude? Now the excuse is made that we don't want to "offend" anyone who does not believe. But what is offensive is celebrating Christmas without acknowledging its meaning.

People want the joy of Christmas but not what is supposed to be the source of that joy, the birth of the Savior. People want to give and receive gifts without acknowledging the big Gift that God gave, His Son. They might not believe in all that but should they not at least make room for it? Why does "inclusivity" always seem to exclude Christians and Jews? They might think that they are honoring all religions, but they are actually honoring none.

Many want the great celebration, but don't want the purpose it was made for. This is not just a problem with Christmas, though; it's a symptom of many areas of our society. For example, the same thing is true for sex. God made sex mainly for procreation, not just pleasure. (For the moment, I will lay aside the proper context for sex - marriage.) Today many want to satisfy their desires without the complication of producing another human being - unless they want it. Procreation is avoided or, if not, there is abortion available. By making sex about pleasure and intimacy only, we are removing the reason it exists.

Many only want the fun part of sex and the procreation part is optional. Many only want the trappings of Christmas and leave out the purpose of it, except for the few that want to express that. It seems to me that with Christmas and sex, our society wants to have the fun part and forget about what it is meant to be. I know that even many conservatives today do not care that Christmas has been so secularized. But this tendency to take what we like and forget the meaning of it is not just seen in Christmas but in many areas in our lives.

I think that this is a bad tendency. Sex has become what it is not intended to be - all about us and not about the propagation of the species (from a scientific point of view) and not about bringing new people, made in the image of God, into the world. We celebrate Christmas with everything we've got and leave out the most important element - the true meaning of it. We are not just being selfish. We are taking away the true meaning of things without regard to how it diminishes human flourishing.

We need meaning within a context. We cannot just make it up as we go along. The true meaning of Christmas gives us joy and peace. Just talking about joy and peace at Christmas does not give it to us. Sex outside the context that God has intended will bring pleasure - for a while. But a married couple creates a child that they both raise and adore. That is where the real blessing is. Western culture has sucked the meaning out of everything with no good substitute. That is why it is dying.