The holidays are officially here. Thanksgiving is upon us, followed ever so closely by Black Friday - a fan favorite. Black Friday really kicks off the whole, festive, happy, energetic, fun, family adventure that is the Christmas season... Dontcha think? All my life Ive heard people say, Christmas is too commercial... I agree. But not in that I hate Christmas because its ruined by all the commercialism way, I agree because people have lost their focus and have allowed Christmas to become about the trappings rather than the heart of the season. Christmas centers around the birth of Jesus Christ, as a fulfillment of prophecy to an ancient race of people, and a symbol of hope for every person born since that prophecy was fulfilled. It isnt about buying gifts for everyone, or even about giving anyone a gift, its about remembering and sharing the hope. Its fascinating that some are so firmly against this simple celebration. They make excuses about commercialism, or about the separation of church and state, or even feel compelled to launch billboard campaigns declaring that they worship nothing and that Christmas is all a giant hoax, but at the core theyre seeking to deny others hope because they themselves have none and dont want others to have what they dont. That selfishness is sad, even more so when it could be cured with just a spark of the hope they deny. Recently Ive been thinking about the way people believe things and how they press their beliefs on others. In this thinking it has occurred to me that there is some common ground shared by members of radical religious movements and atheists. Im sure some atheists will find this insulting, but they find a lot of things insulting so they should be accustomed to that by now. Heres what they share: intolerance. Think about it. Those classy nutcases at the Wilksboro Baptist Church stand on street corners with picket signs declaring who and what God hates. They may be at a sporting event, a political rally, a school function or even the funeral of a fallen soldier, but theyre going to let everyone know God hates something about whatever is happening. Arent they a happy bunch? Their intolerance for anything but what their leader tells them is correct drives them to condemn others, driving wedges between people rather than drawing them together, and at the same time driving people away from the God they claim to serve. Considering this, isnt it odd that Jesus walked among and dined with people lost in the most vile of sin, yet never condemned them? Rather, He exercised the ultimate tolerance and taught them truth in ways they could easily grasp. Jesus reserved condemnation for religious manipulators, the Pharisees. Or, as we would call them today, those wonderfully intolerant picketers - the members of Wliksboro Baptist. Islam, also known as the religion of peace, is spreading around the globe. It isnt spreading because the religion brings peace to the soul or answers to lifes deepest questions, its spreading because angry, uneducated young men attach themselves to it as a way to change their world into a place where they can have power over those they perceive to be oppressing them. Islam recruits at the edge of a sword and the point of a gun, and it recruits for life. Walk away from Islam and you sign your own death sentence. Ridicule Islam and you do the same. You are either Muslim or you are an infidel, and infidels dont deserve to draw breath in an Islamic world. You may deny this as much as you like, but you may as well deny that your gas tank is empty because you dont believe the needle on your dashboard is telling the truth. Atheism is walking much the same path as Wilksboro Baptist and Islam, only without the death threats and violence. Todays condescending and smugly superior atheists sincerely believe that you must be an idiot to believe in anything beyond what your senses can prove to be true and that science supports. Try to persuade one of these intolerant pseudo-intellectuals that there may be reality beyond their experience or the reach of current science and theyll smother you with hyperlinks to articles and research papers supporting their position. Then theyll tell you that you dont understand, and cant understand, and that you may never understand because youre so stupid you believe some guy in the sky made everything. Basically, unless you agree with them, youre mentally insufficient to discuss anything whatsoever. And, if you are an atheist and decide to pursue a faith life, you fall from their elite position and are no longer worthy of their attention except to ridicule anything you may say about, well, anything at all. You are essentially dead to them. What would be wrong with just letting idiots believe whatever they want? They could infect others with their idiocy, thats what. So they must be stopped. Intolerance. It is this intolerance which drives the anti-Christmas billboard campaigns and the separation of church and state lawsuits. This intolerance will not allow anyone to celebrate something which cant possibly be real, and claiming it is a breach of the separation of church and state is their legal method of stopping it from happening. If they dont believe it, you cant either. Not anywhere they can legally prevent you from doing so. How sad. I remember a day when everyone understood that common ground was better than ravines of difference. I remember when we all understood that it was beneficial to wish each other well even if we didnt agree on everything. As comic Brad Stine says, I remember a day when you could say, Merry Christmas, Mr. Lowenstein!, and Mr. Lowenstein would respond, Merry Christmas to you! even though he was Jewish and didnt believe in the core of the holiday, but he did believe in good will toward men. He understood that we could love one another and support one another even if we had different views. And thats whats missing in all the anti-Christmas and anti-Christianity sentiment today; good will toward men. Its at the core of the Christmas story. The angels declared Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men. (Luke 2:13-15) We achieve peace on earth when we exercise that good will toward one another. Not when we divide, accuse, and refuse to tolerate. When we accept, love, and wish each other well in spite of what we dont have in common, we become a powerful force for good. Will we ever all agree? No. It wont happen. But we can all reach out in good will and overlook our differences for the sake of making a better life for all. And thats a great recipe for truly Happy Holidays.
Posted on: Fri, 29 Nov 2013 12:00:00 +0000
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