A version of this article was published by TheBlaze. Please click here to read it.
Ah, Christmas — the most wonderful time of year for Christians. Well, for almost all of them.
We are living in oxymoronic times. Everyone who is a follower of Jesus Christ recognizes that the celebration of Christmas is a time to commemorate the birth of God incarnate. Yet for liberal Christians, Christmas also signifies a season where apologies need to be divvied out to anyone offended by their faith’s polarizing influence over culture.
Sticking their heads in the snow again this December, fanciful allegations of a non-existent war on Christmas are flowing from the keyboards of prominent members of the Evangelical Left. But the assaults on Christmas are much more serious than a tiff over seasonal greetings. There are current legal battles waging over Christian’s capacity to celebrate Christmas in the public square that are being ignored.
Still liberal Christian figures like Paul Raushenbush, The Huffington Post’s Senior Religion Editor, dismiss the “War on Christmas” discussions as a hyperbolic tug-o-war between expressions of “Happy Holidays” and “Merry Christmas” at the K-Mart cash register.
So too does Patheos’“former-fundamentalist” turned liberal Christian blogger Benjamin Corey. “Keeping the ‘X’ in Xmas: it’s not some secular conspiracy” is Corey’s recent blog claiming that Christians who acknowledge any sort of war on Christmas are paranoid and need to “insert a quick apology into some of our Christmas cards to our atheist neighbors.
“Backfired” is the only way to describe Corey’s attempt to clear atheists of any schemes to intentionally remove Christ from Christmas.
Because towering in the middle of New York City’s Times Square is a digital billboard advertisement purchased by American Atheists. The billboard reads, “Celebrating the Real Meaning of Xmas” and “Who Needs Christ During Christmas? Nobody” and “Happy Holidays,” love the tolerant and respectful folks at American Atheists.
Liberal Christians like Corey and Raushenbush want so badly to appear popular among secular culture that they willfully dismiss assaults on their own holiday and belittle their traditional counterparts as nothing more than conspiracy thinkers.
Specifically, attacks like those launched by the American Humanist Association (AHA) on Operation Christmas child are conveniently left unmentioned by liberal Christians. When AHA sent letters to charter Schools in Colorado and South Carolina threatening lawsuits unless they abandon participation in Operation Christmas Child, an international evangelical ministry that sends shoe boxes filled with gifts and the story of Jesus to impoverished children, liberal Christians silently looked the other way.
Question for my liberal Christian friends: How is siding with atheist groups that forbid a Christian shoe box ministry for impoverished children demonstrating a concern for social justice, poverty and spreading good cheer to our fellow man? It makes no sense that Christ followers should deny goodies accompanied with the message of eternal hope to children who will otherwise receive zilch this Christmas, for the sake of sidestepping offense to a few privileged first-world atheists.
So this Christmas, let us pray that liberal Christians abandon the tired and unbelievable arguments of a non-existent war on Christmas and instead come alongside their brothers and sisters they demean as “bigoted” and “intolerant” and join us as we unapologetically speak out against injustices aimed at our shared faith, all in the name of the reason for the season.
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