Christmas trees are pagan tradition co-opted by the Catholic church. One of the reasons it took so long for the US to adopt the christmas tree was the resistance of protestants to what they considered a pagan corruption of christianity. Christmas itself was considered “papist” and many of the early settlers were hostile towards it, preached against it, some even banned it.

Gift giving was pushed by corporations trying to sell more products. The widespread adoption of christmas was an early marketing effort. Worked too. As much as 50% of retail sales are christmas shopping.

It’s not clear whether Mr. Weaver opposes Christmas because he is against supposedly inauthentic forms of Christianity, or because he’s against Christianity itself. I say this because in another discussion Mr. Weaver issues the standard leftist attack on Christianity as being in collusion with slavery, the oppression of women, and so on. So apparently he will pick up on any opportune argument, from whatever source, to make Christianity or Christmas look bad.

Here’s the true meanng of Christmas, which I heard from Fr. Andrew Mead’s sermon at St. Thomas Episcopal Church yesterday. God gave his only begotten son—perfect God and perfect man—into the world, that the world through him might be saved and receive eternal life in God. What we do at Christmas in giving gifts is replicating God’s perfect act of giving of himself.

As for the pagan sources of the Christmas traditions such as the Christmas tree, why should there be any objection to this? Much of Christianity involved taking existing pagan traditions and raising them to a higher level. The whole world had practiced animal sacrifice—and, in the case of the peoples of pre-Columbian South America, human sacrifice—for millennia prior to Christ. Christ showed the spiritual meaning of sacrifice. Christ takes people as he finds them, and raises them up.

The linked item includes this:

“An insert in the New York Times Magazine of November 18 entitled, “The Best of the Season,” had a calendar section that listed events for Hanukkah on December 9 and Kwanzaa events for December 26. For December 25, the only listing was for “A walking tour through a century-and-a-half of Jewish history” on the Lower East Side.”

All this is quite deliberate and typical of the inexpressibly nasty New York Times, which through myriad indirect as well as direct ways tears down our civilization. A couple of months ago at the time of the 9/11 observance they had a photograph on the front page of the great statue of George Washington at Wall and Broad Street, with a cleaning person holding up a rag on a long stick to that the rag was sticking right into Washington nose. It was a deliberate affront, and on the front page of America’s most prominent newspaper. In any other age, this would have been inconceivable. Or, if it had happened, there would have been cries of outrage and the paper would have apologized. No more. Such attitudes now convey the true nature of our dominant culture.

Doug, it’s *obviously* false that anything like 50% of retail sales are Christmas shopping. People are more likely to respond to you if they have the impression you’ve thought about what you’re saying.