If Christmas were to vanish from the face of the earth along with all those annoying songs, it would not make any difference at all to my faith. I would still be called upon to love God and my neighbor regardless of the time of the year. That having been said, Marduk and Saturnalia are long gone. The current celebration we call Christmas (aka "The time to spend more money than you have on gifts for people you don't even like") does in fact have Christian roots. Santa is a stand-in for St. Nicholas and gift giving reminds us of the gifts brought to Jesus by the Magi and so forth. But, we have preserved the form while hollowing out the content. That's the evil genius of marketing.
You can certainly see it for yourself in all those Christmas movies which start playing in July in which the idea of Jesus being born to save us from our sins as mentioned in Matthew's gospel never rates a single line in the script. I don't begrudge people who just enjoy the season but let's be open about the fact that this represents a turning away from Christianity in this nation. Eventually, I suspect that we'll get to the point that we'll rename the month of December. We'll call it Hallmark instead. LOL!
"PARIS, Nov 27 (Reuters) - Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo on Monday announced she was quitting the X platform formerly known as Twitter, calling it a "gigantic global sewer" that was "destroying our democracies" by spreading abuse and misinformation. After buying Twitter in 2022, Elon Musk laid off thousands of employees, including many who moderated content on the platform. Rebranded as X, it has lost several major advertisers and was blasted by critics, including the White House, for not doing enough to curtail antisemitism."
Oh Uncle Duke hits it out of the park with such a simple, humble photo. My LOL is typically my vote and often goes UD's way. Congrats Zorn on another year! I will continue moving forward in time and space with the PS.
EZ. Which of your list of items brings the current Covid situation to "ominous" in your opinion?
1. "the numbers now appear to be slowly ticking back up..."? Appear? Slowly?
2. "Midwestern and Western states have recently seen the highest rates of positive tests." Some geographic area has to have the highest rates, right?
3. "COVID hospitalizations were up 8.6% in the most recent week for which the CDC has data, but still far below pandemic levels." Tells me nothing other than up 8.6% from the week before. It's down 13% from the September 9th number and 25% from a year ago.
I thought Danial B's comments were solid. Pro vax, pro booster, pro stay at home, anti excessive testing and anti alarmist.
Yes - those alarming quotes are exactly the kind of cherry-picked, innumerate stats that writers use to back up their opinions or narratives. They seem plausible and not factually inaccurate, but they’re just the items that someone found which happen to agree with their claim. It took me years to learn to read this kind of writing for what it is - a goal-directed survey of facts to find and print only those that agree with the claim. Unfortunately that is about all you get in journalism on “issues” today. Even popular and professional scientific writing is now persuasion instead of investigation and presentation.
There is so much handwringing over how much we look at our phones, but I can't make a move without it anymore. I need it for concert tickets, theatre tickets, plane tickets, to schedule appointments and to schedule yoga classes. And apps! Please no more, unless someone invents a drone that will dust my house.
I detest the fact that you need the phone for everything, especially for concerts, ball games, theme parks, etc (“Your phone is your ticket!”. Oh, does that mean that as long as I have a phone that I don’t have to pay to get in ?), in large part because I am, apparently, one of the last remaining humans who would rather not be glued to this weapon of mass distraction at all times.
In some ways, I’d be perfectly cheerful if our phones lost the ability to make phone calls (devoting the saved resources to other uses or to lowering the purchase price) and public telephones made a comeback.
"People are free to do what they are comfortable with, but suggesting that masking protects others is the same as saying that those who don’t mask choose to not care about others."
Yes, exactly. I went to a bunch of stores this past weekend and I noticed an uptick in people wearing masks. Which is fine! Whatever you need to feel safe. But like, I hope these people don't think I'm an anti-science grandma killer because I'm not wearing one.
Why so political a response? It seems to me anti-maskers are becoming as hostile as anti-vaxxers. Masking is optional, as is testing, and none need to fear judgement on either side.
At least half the people I see with masks are wearing them under their chin. Is this some kind of virtue signaling? Wear them or don't, but make up your mind
As The Season approaches, I think about how much simpler life must be for civilizations who live near the equator, where days and nights are always about the same length.
I understand that for those of us who grew up in non-equatorial regions, the never-changing sunrise / sunset feels very odd. I don't think I would trade the very short days of winter for every day being the same.
I'm not sure which side is worse - those who demand "Merry Christmas" vs "Happy Holidays" or those that argue "Christmas" celebrations were around before anointed the Birthday of Jesus. Yes - Winter Solstice and celebrations have been around much longer. But - Yes- Jesus is the Reason for the (Christmas) season. It's the Christ in Christmas. Even if you take out the Christian related 'holiday' songs from Songs of Good Cheer - I don't people are looking for songs of Marduk. Celebrate or don't celebrate. Celebrate as a Christian or don't celebrate as a Christian. Today's world it's all mix together - and it won't split off any time soon. Arguing how seasonal celebrations should or should not be celebrated (partied)- is ridiculous. Let it go people.
That's fair. Although it's close to arguing that Christmas doesn't have a space. As everything - things are viewed from the extremes: It's all Christmas or It's Not All About Christmas. It seems ridiculous that people are arguing about how to party appropriately. Do you people!
2. What meaning of the season has been historically for our culture/country
3. What the meaning of the season has come to mean for us individually and collectively.
4. Why do people people make a big deal about how others observe the season (e.g. seasonal red cups at Starbucks)
You addressed the first item, and I agree with all of your points. IMO the fourth item on my list is what brings the issue up at all. I think there are some (I am not one of them) who believe that America is a Christian nation. They see the secularization as a threat and push back. What was done in ancient Babylon is beside the point. To them, celebrating Jesus is part of american culture.
I am fine with the Jesus folks celebrating Christmas as a religious holiday. I am NOT fine with them insisting that the rest of us do so. And I particularly dislike the assertion that Jesus is "The Reason for the Season." Well, he is ONE reason for the season. Some of us have other reasons for celebrating the winter solstice, or whatever celebration they enjoy / participate in. And the notion that someone else can declare MY reasons ineligible is insulting.
And if it took the Catholic Church 350 years to declare that December 25 was the day, well, what took them so long? - Presumably, it was not a bolt of lightning out of a clear blue sky that took 350 years to arrive? I suspect the Pope had other reasons to pick the date. And because the calendar has been shifted around since then, December 25 doesn't land on the same day as it did then. Did December 25 jump 11 days when the Gregorian calendar kicked in? - I didn't think so.
Christmas is Christmas because we agree it exists. The meaning and importance of it is determined by each of us.
I am with you on all of those points, but I may have less conviction than you. There is something about having a collective shared experience of holidays that make the collection of humans living inside our borders a culture. For example, we don't all get to decide our own reason for making the 4th of July or Veteran's day a special day. Of course a person could do that, but they would be deserving of our scorn. I would even say the people of rebrand Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples day are specifically picking Columbus Day to make a point. I doubt there is much interest in making it a separate holiday.
I agree with you because American culture is so much more than Christian culture, and by convention people who don't observe Christmas get included in community holiday events. That is all good, and positive. But that is just my opinion, which is no more valid than anyone else's. If someone thinks the Christian Christmas should be the only recognition of the holiday season then it means we disagree about what the American culture is and should be, but I can't say they are objectively wrong. It is valid to assert that some holidays should have just one meaning for a culture.
We spent time in Tokyo, and right after Halloween (they don't have Thanksgiving) they put up large Christmas trees and Santa Clauses, play American Christmas music and carols in all the stores and on the streets, and "Merry Christmas" signs are everywhere. Of course only a very small minority of Japanese are Christians (and most don't understand English) but they take no offense in listening to Bing Crosby sing Away in the Manger and Hark the Harold Angles Sing. They do not even have the day off of work but they enjoy getting together for fried chicken dinners on Christmas Eve. Like many Americans, they enjoyed their evolving Christmas "traditions". It was refreshing being there and seeing signs that say, "Merry Christmas" and "Seasons Greeting" or "Happy Holidays" without anyone taking sides.
What do I wish my iPhone could do? I didn't know I wanted text messaging, a camera, TV, weather, or electronic maps until it was provided. What remains to be added? I probably won't know until someone invents it. But I am rooting for the universal translator. And teleportation would be convenient.
Google Translate comes pretty close to being a universal translator. I have a friend who spent some time in Thailand, talking to GT on his iPhone in English and having the iPhone speak the corresponding Thai a moment later. He said it worked great!
1. How about an app that tells the user to put the phone down now and interact with the human beings in front of him/her. It would be especially useful during holiday gatherings.
2. Football and timing - so American. I saw my first soccer game in Europe and kept looking for a clock in relation to the game ending. Well I thought the clock ran out, but they were still playing?
I was told the refs had added time because of delays during the game. How long I asked. Oh about 3 or 4 minutes. Wow, no defined time…I am in a different planet.
3. Speaking of football, is football the reason for the Thanksgiving season?
4. Watching the cop and kid interaction, I thought about a secondary aspect rather than the primary issue of who is at fault. How many more confrontations did the cop have that day? How many other comments did the kid make during the day? How many “breakups” did the teacher do that day? Were we seeing an unusual amount of violence…or just business as usual in a string of incidents?
It seemed like everyone in the video acted as this was just another day with a violent exchange and to move on. Nothing unusual here.
The iPhone allows users to set daily time limits on certain apps. After X minutes of use, the app will be locked and you won't get notifications from it. Out of sight, out of mind.
And then each Sunday the phone gives you your daily screen time average for the week. It's a subtle way to shame you.
The first soccer game I saw live was in Rio (where watching the fans was much more entertaining than watching the game). For most of the game, the clock showed only remaining minutes. It wasn't until the last minute of play that it counted down seconds. On reflection, I thought "If there's 12 or so minutes left in the 2nd quarter of an American football game, does it really matter whether it's 12:42 or 12:06?"
Once again, I find an issue that complicated what to me seems a rather simple issue. When I was a kid, my family started celebrating both Christmas and Chanukah. Christmas was definitely more fun, because I got presents. It never occurred to me to research where the whole idea came from. As I got older, the scope of the season increased. I knew that school was closed for several weeks. Most businesses were closed for Christmas Day and New Years Day. People had parties. The reason for the celebration was never clear, but it was fun. I have no idea what the celebrations have to do with Jesus, whenever his birth happens to be. People like to celebrate. They like to drink. They like time off from work. Groundhog Day would work just as well if people got the day off. I don't wish to offend serious Christians, who feel that this would be a slap at their Lord. Just how many have researched the issue to the extent done in this column and have any idea when Jesus was born? And what does making merry and getting gloriously drunk have to do with celebrating the life of Jesus? And just where does Santa fit in along with the idea of getting free stuff from people you know? It's a dark and depressing time of year. In northern parts, the weather is cold and gloomy and depressing and the days are short. Maybe for many, that's enough of a reason to celebrate.
My son works in a suburban hospital and admissions for COVID/flu/RSV are up. Most people get mild cases of those illnesses but for some they are still deadly. Worth it to get vaccinated for COVID and flu (and RSV if over 60 or pregnant) and wear a mask to protect those folks and ourselves. Only a very small percentage (under 20%) of eligible people have received the 5th COVID shot.
I wish my iPhone could make a sandwich.
OK, you're a sandwich! ba-da-BING
Denis -
You mis-read his wish - he didn't say "make *me* a sandwich" - he said "make a sandwich"
If Christmas were to vanish from the face of the earth along with all those annoying songs, it would not make any difference at all to my faith. I would still be called upon to love God and my neighbor regardless of the time of the year. That having been said, Marduk and Saturnalia are long gone. The current celebration we call Christmas (aka "The time to spend more money than you have on gifts for people you don't even like") does in fact have Christian roots. Santa is a stand-in for St. Nicholas and gift giving reminds us of the gifts brought to Jesus by the Magi and so forth. But, we have preserved the form while hollowing out the content. That's the evil genius of marketing.
You can certainly see it for yourself in all those Christmas movies which start playing in July in which the idea of Jesus being born to save us from our sins as mentioned in Matthew's gospel never rates a single line in the script. I don't begrudge people who just enjoy the season but let's be open about the fact that this represents a turning away from Christianity in this nation. Eventually, I suspect that we'll get to the point that we'll rename the month of December. We'll call it Hallmark instead. LOL!
Among the first of very many, I hope.
"PARIS, Nov 27 (Reuters) - Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo on Monday announced she was quitting the X platform formerly known as Twitter, calling it a "gigantic global sewer" that was "destroying our democracies" by spreading abuse and misinformation. After buying Twitter in 2022, Elon Musk laid off thousands of employees, including many who moderated content on the platform. Rebranded as X, it has lost several major advertisers and was blasted by critics, including the White House, for not doing enough to curtail antisemitism."
Oh Uncle Duke hits it out of the park with such a simple, humble photo. My LOL is typically my vote and often goes UD's way. Congrats Zorn on another year! I will continue moving forward in time and space with the PS.
EZ. Which of your list of items brings the current Covid situation to "ominous" in your opinion?
1. "the numbers now appear to be slowly ticking back up..."? Appear? Slowly?
2. "Midwestern and Western states have recently seen the highest rates of positive tests." Some geographic area has to have the highest rates, right?
3. "COVID hospitalizations were up 8.6% in the most recent week for which the CDC has data, but still far below pandemic levels." Tells me nothing other than up 8.6% from the week before. It's down 13% from the September 9th number and 25% from a year ago.
I thought Danial B's comments were solid. Pro vax, pro booster, pro stay at home, anti excessive testing and anti alarmist.
Thank you! It also doesn't appear that the alarmists and maskers care enough to get vaccinated. The vaccination rate is abysmally low.
Yes - those alarming quotes are exactly the kind of cherry-picked, innumerate stats that writers use to back up their opinions or narratives. They seem plausible and not factually inaccurate, but they’re just the items that someone found which happen to agree with their claim. It took me years to learn to read this kind of writing for what it is - a goal-directed survey of facts to find and print only those that agree with the claim. Unfortunately that is about all you get in journalism on “issues” today. Even popular and professional scientific writing is now persuasion instead of investigation and presentation.
There is so much handwringing over how much we look at our phones, but I can't make a move without it anymore. I need it for concert tickets, theatre tickets, plane tickets, to schedule appointments and to schedule yoga classes. And apps! Please no more, unless someone invents a drone that will dust my house.
I detest the fact that you need the phone for everything, especially for concerts, ball games, theme parks, etc (“Your phone is your ticket!”. Oh, does that mean that as long as I have a phone that I don’t have to pay to get in ?), in large part because I am, apparently, one of the last remaining humans who would rather not be glued to this weapon of mass distraction at all times.
In some ways, I’d be perfectly cheerful if our phones lost the ability to make phone calls (devoting the saved resources to other uses or to lowering the purchase price) and public telephones made a comeback.
"People are free to do what they are comfortable with, but suggesting that masking protects others is the same as saying that those who don’t mask choose to not care about others."
Yes, exactly. I went to a bunch of stores this past weekend and I noticed an uptick in people wearing masks. Which is fine! Whatever you need to feel safe. But like, I hope these people don't think I'm an anti-science grandma killer because I'm not wearing one.
Why so political a response? It seems to me anti-maskers are becoming as hostile as anti-vaxxers. Masking is optional, as is testing, and none need to fear judgement on either side.
At least half the people I see with masks are wearing them under their chin. Is this some kind of virtue signaling? Wear them or don't, but make up your mind
As The Season approaches, I think about how much simpler life must be for civilizations who live near the equator, where days and nights are always about the same length.
I understand that for those of us who grew up in non-equatorial regions, the never-changing sunrise / sunset feels very odd. I don't think I would trade the very short days of winter for every day being the same.
I don’t think the need for shepherds to tend their flocks by night is exactly seasonal, especially in a Mediterranean climate.
I'm not sure which side is worse - those who demand "Merry Christmas" vs "Happy Holidays" or those that argue "Christmas" celebrations were around before anointed the Birthday of Jesus. Yes - Winter Solstice and celebrations have been around much longer. But - Yes- Jesus is the Reason for the (Christmas) season. It's the Christ in Christmas. Even if you take out the Christian related 'holiday' songs from Songs of Good Cheer - I don't people are looking for songs of Marduk. Celebrate or don't celebrate. Celebrate as a Christian or don't celebrate as a Christian. Today's world it's all mix together - and it won't split off any time soon. Arguing how seasonal celebrations should or should not be celebrated (partied)- is ridiculous. Let it go people.
I see my little essay as a response to those who want to define the season for others.
That's fair. Although it's close to arguing that Christmas doesn't have a space. As everything - things are viewed from the extremes: It's all Christmas or It's Not All About Christmas. It seems ridiculous that people are arguing about how to party appropriately. Do you people!
The reason for the season has multiple meanings:
1. the origin of winter solstice celebrations
2. What meaning of the season has been historically for our culture/country
3. What the meaning of the season has come to mean for us individually and collectively.
4. Why do people people make a big deal about how others observe the season (e.g. seasonal red cups at Starbucks)
You addressed the first item, and I agree with all of your points. IMO the fourth item on my list is what brings the issue up at all. I think there are some (I am not one of them) who believe that America is a Christian nation. They see the secularization as a threat and push back. What was done in ancient Babylon is beside the point. To them, celebrating Jesus is part of american culture.
I am fine with the Jesus folks celebrating Christmas as a religious holiday. I am NOT fine with them insisting that the rest of us do so. And I particularly dislike the assertion that Jesus is "The Reason for the Season." Well, he is ONE reason for the season. Some of us have other reasons for celebrating the winter solstice, or whatever celebration they enjoy / participate in. And the notion that someone else can declare MY reasons ineligible is insulting.
And if it took the Catholic Church 350 years to declare that December 25 was the day, well, what took them so long? - Presumably, it was not a bolt of lightning out of a clear blue sky that took 350 years to arrive? I suspect the Pope had other reasons to pick the date. And because the calendar has been shifted around since then, December 25 doesn't land on the same day as it did then. Did December 25 jump 11 days when the Gregorian calendar kicked in? - I didn't think so.
Christmas is Christmas because we agree it exists. The meaning and importance of it is determined by each of us.
I am with you on all of those points, but I may have less conviction than you. There is something about having a collective shared experience of holidays that make the collection of humans living inside our borders a culture. For example, we don't all get to decide our own reason for making the 4th of July or Veteran's day a special day. Of course a person could do that, but they would be deserving of our scorn. I would even say the people of rebrand Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples day are specifically picking Columbus Day to make a point. I doubt there is much interest in making it a separate holiday.
I agree with you because American culture is so much more than Christian culture, and by convention people who don't observe Christmas get included in community holiday events. That is all good, and positive. But that is just my opinion, which is no more valid than anyone else's. If someone thinks the Christian Christmas should be the only recognition of the holiday season then it means we disagree about what the American culture is and should be, but I can't say they are objectively wrong. It is valid to assert that some holidays should have just one meaning for a culture.
We spent time in Tokyo, and right after Halloween (they don't have Thanksgiving) they put up large Christmas trees and Santa Clauses, play American Christmas music and carols in all the stores and on the streets, and "Merry Christmas" signs are everywhere. Of course only a very small minority of Japanese are Christians (and most don't understand English) but they take no offense in listening to Bing Crosby sing Away in the Manger and Hark the Harold Angles Sing. They do not even have the day off of work but they enjoy getting together for fried chicken dinners on Christmas Eve. Like many Americans, they enjoyed their evolving Christmas "traditions". It was refreshing being there and seeing signs that say, "Merry Christmas" and "Seasons Greeting" or "Happy Holidays" without anyone taking sides.
What do I wish my iPhone could do? I didn't know I wanted text messaging, a camera, TV, weather, or electronic maps until it was provided. What remains to be added? I probably won't know until someone invents it. But I am rooting for the universal translator. And teleportation would be convenient.
Google Translate comes pretty close to being a universal translator. I have a friend who spent some time in Thailand, talking to GT on his iPhone in English and having the iPhone speak the corresponding Thai a moment later. He said it worked great!
Thoughts and comments…
1. How about an app that tells the user to put the phone down now and interact with the human beings in front of him/her. It would be especially useful during holiday gatherings.
2. Football and timing - so American. I saw my first soccer game in Europe and kept looking for a clock in relation to the game ending. Well I thought the clock ran out, but they were still playing?
I was told the refs had added time because of delays during the game. How long I asked. Oh about 3 or 4 minutes. Wow, no defined time…I am in a different planet.
3. Speaking of football, is football the reason for the Thanksgiving season?
4. Watching the cop and kid interaction, I thought about a secondary aspect rather than the primary issue of who is at fault. How many more confrontations did the cop have that day? How many other comments did the kid make during the day? How many “breakups” did the teacher do that day? Were we seeing an unusual amount of violence…or just business as usual in a string of incidents?
It seemed like everyone in the video acted as this was just another day with a violent exchange and to move on. Nothing unusual here.
The iPhone allows users to set daily time limits on certain apps. After X minutes of use, the app will be locked and you won't get notifications from it. Out of sight, out of mind.
And then each Sunday the phone gives you your daily screen time average for the week. It's a subtle way to shame you.
Yes, but I'm not the least bit ashamed of the time I use my phone
The first soccer game I saw live was in Rio (where watching the fans was much more entertaining than watching the game). For most of the game, the clock showed only remaining minutes. It wasn't until the last minute of play that it counted down seconds. On reflection, I thought "If there's 12 or so minutes left in the 2nd quarter of an American football game, does it really matter whether it's 12:42 or 12:06?"
Once again, I find an issue that complicated what to me seems a rather simple issue. When I was a kid, my family started celebrating both Christmas and Chanukah. Christmas was definitely more fun, because I got presents. It never occurred to me to research where the whole idea came from. As I got older, the scope of the season increased. I knew that school was closed for several weeks. Most businesses were closed for Christmas Day and New Years Day. People had parties. The reason for the celebration was never clear, but it was fun. I have no idea what the celebrations have to do with Jesus, whenever his birth happens to be. People like to celebrate. They like to drink. They like time off from work. Groundhog Day would work just as well if people got the day off. I don't wish to offend serious Christians, who feel that this would be a slap at their Lord. Just how many have researched the issue to the extent done in this column and have any idea when Jesus was born? And what does making merry and getting gloriously drunk have to do with celebrating the life of Jesus? And just where does Santa fit in along with the idea of getting free stuff from people you know? It's a dark and depressing time of year. In northern parts, the weather is cold and gloomy and depressing and the days are short. Maybe for many, that's enough of a reason to celebrate.
My son works in a suburban hospital and admissions for COVID/flu/RSV are up. Most people get mild cases of those illnesses but for some they are still deadly. Worth it to get vaccinated for COVID and flu (and RSV if over 60 or pregnant) and wear a mask to protect those folks and ourselves. Only a very small percentage (under 20%) of eligible people have received the 5th COVID shot.
Saturnalia? Sacaea? Christmas? I think we can now see these “celebrations” for what they really always were: blasphemous salvos in the War on Zagmuk.