The War on Christmas continues to affect our communities

on December 5, 2013

Last week we discussed some attempts at making Christmas politically correct. But, there are groups which seek to silence Christmas through more direct and involving ways.

In mid-November, a charter school in South Carolina, East Point Academy, was forced to cancel its tradition of participating in Operation Christmas Child. The project, from Samaritan’s Purse, sends shoe boxes filled with toys, sweets and hygiene products to impoverished children across the globe. The school was forced to do s0 because the American Humanist Association (AHA) sent them a letter and warned if they did not cease and desist, the school would be sued. Being so small and not having the funds to fight back, the school had no choice but to stop participating in this charitable project. Todd Starnes, for FoxNews.com, also covered the incident, highlighting what a true shame the cancellation was in concluding:

So, thanks to a bunch of godless, heartless “humanist” bullies, dozens of poor children will wake up on Christmas morning without a single toy.

How inhumane of the humanists.

And, within a week later, another small school, SkyView Academy, in Colorado, also received a letter from the organization. The school did not have the funds for a legal battle, and so their Operation Christmas Child efforts were canceled. Todd Starnes reported on this incident as well, and this time, students fought back. The project was moved to a public sidewalk, where a religious rights rally was held.

While mentioning that KUSA-TV reported SkyView Elementary Principal Mike Munier said in an e-mail that SkyView “had an indefensible case due to a mistake on our part[,]” TheBlaze points out that “it is unclear what, exactly, he was referencing.” There may have been misunderstanding with how Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a Christian law firm, advised the academy.

What is at the heart of the matter is that the charitable underpinnings of Christmas gets ruined. Those from SkyView who rallied on a public sidewalk recognized this, with signs reading “Humanists hate kids” and “You won’t steal Christmas from children.” Perhaps these humanists do not “hate kids,” but do hate religion. And the image they present of themselves has not been a friendly one.

Todd Starnes references parent Kendal Unruh, who he contacted in a phone interview. “We know this is a bullying tactic,” said Unruh. And, TheBlaze titled their piece mentioned above “‘The Definition of Bullying’: Church vs. State Threat Leads Another School to Cut Ties with Operation Christmas Child,'” in reference to Unruh’s statements.

Starnes mentioned that AHA “accused [the school] of bribing children to convert to Christianity.” Roy Speckhardt, Executive Director of American Humanist Association, continued this theme while explaining why his organization is against Operation Christmas, but arguing why you should be as well. In writing for The Huffington Post, Speckhardt mentions “student labor,” “religious intrusion,” and “exploitation.” He says:

Reputable, religiously-neutral programs like Toys for Tots, a charity that collects new toys and donates them to poor children, are being supplanted by these discriminatory religious organizations that use holiday presents to entice kids in non-Christian families to convert.

Apparently, it is such a shock to Speckhardt that an organization could be so proud of its good deeds, which may include bringing children to Christ. He says, “And Operation Christmas Child isn’t shy about their efforts, bragging about the thousands of kids they’ve converted.”

Speckhardt had previously appeared on The Kelly File, with host Megyn Kelly. There he was a lot less eloquent, because he could not say that his organization was doing anything for the children who would not receive a shoe box from Operation Christmas Child on Christmas morning.

Some have accused those who have tried to “Keep Christ in Christmas” of  overlooking history or missing the point, though such articles  don’t acknowledge what atheists are actually trying to do. And although those fighting the War on Christmas face mockery and criticism, Bill O’Reilly is still dedicated to “looking out for the folks.” For his “Talking Point Memo” on December 2, O’Reilly discussed “The war on Christmas centralizes.”

O’Reilly discussed a bit of history behind Christmas being declared a federal holiday, and how the War on Christmas came to be:

Everything was swell up until about ten years ago when creeping secularism and pressure groups like the ACLU began attacking the Christmas holiday. They demanded, demanded the word “Christmas” be removed from advertising and public displays and many people caved in to that. So now we have the happy holiday syndrome.

The “absurdity” of substituting “Christmas” for “holiday” is highlighted:

So here is my question to Macy’s. What holiday is Santa celebrating? Winter solstice, the birthday of a reindeer — what? On the national front, there are three primary culprits seeking to diminish Christmas, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Freedom from Religion Foundation and the American Humanist Association. The most aggressive is the Freedom from Religion Foundation, which routinely threatens to sue small towns and school districts if they dare utter the word “Christmas” or allow choirs to sing carols in public schools.

All this is evidenced further by the AHA’s attack against Operation Christmas Child, and demonstrates it is the atheists who “are the oppressors.”

At the end of the memo there is a shout out to Alliance Defending Freedom, which, wait for it, proclaims that “[m]arriage is the lifelong union of husband and wife.”  And how dare they  educate the public on DOMA and Prop 8 from their viewpoint.

Now Bill O’Reilly does not feel strongly about gay marriage either way, and he did not refer to ADF specifically for their stance on marriage, rather simply stated “[t]hey have been very successful in defending traditional rights in the courts. Therefore I say to them God bless you, each and every one, with apologies to Dickens.”

Well, you would think that O’Reilly was praising a group who felt about homosexuals in the way the Westboro Baptist Church does. The outrage from those outlets which borrow the Southern Poverty Law Center’s term of describing ADF as “virulently antigay,” seems to be a harsh overreaction. And, at least one source claims that ADF is behind the idea of the War on Christmas. While O’Reilly never referenced gay rights during this “Talking Points Memo,” to borrow his term, it is they who “are the oppressors” for unfairly targeting Bill O’Reilly and ADF with an unrelated issue.

The Freedom from Religion Foundation, a group which O’Reilly referred to, sought to also make their group and their beliefs (or lack thereof) known this season. In Chicago’s Daley Plaza they assembled a banner that celebrated the Bill of Rights, but from an anti-Christmas perspective, and erected an 8.5 foot tall lighted “A” for atheism. When reporting on the story, TheBlaze also pointed out that to claim the 20 percent of Americans who report not being affiliated with a specific faith would subscribe to the “A” is problematic:

It is somewhat misleading to assume, though, that the entirety of this cohort would embrace the “A” symbol or the banner, as many people who fall under this category believe in a God but simply do not subscribe to a specific theological system, as TheBlaze has covered extensively.

Fox Nation has also compiled a map titled “War on Christmas” where issues are happening that endanger the Christmas holiday. Some incidents include banning of Christmas carols, calling Christmas trees “holiday trees” and issues with Christmas decorations.

Bill O’Reilly acknowledges that “[the atheists] are free to celebrate whatever they want to celebrate. They are free not to believe and they are free to snicker at anybody who does believe.” And so do we have a right to protect this federal holiday and remind people of the real reason for the season.

  1. Comment by Bishop Andrew Gerales Gentry on December 10, 2013 at 9:25 pm

    On a recent local morning news programme the daily “question” was “name a city in the United States that has a Christmas theme”. All the answers were the typical “Santa Claus” jolly elf and reindeer kind and according to the same local station the correct one was in fact “Mistletoe”!

    Bethlehem, Pennsylvania did not make the list nor did St Joseph’s, Missouri, nor St Marys, Maryland. In other words in the minds of most people it is the names and words that suggest purchases being made and “presents” be delivered or good time feel good parties that comprise Christmas. The real war, not the invented and contrived one invented by the marketeers of Fox News, waged by the great god of greed and gluttony commonly called consumerism has won the hearts and minds of the people and the Babe in the Manager gets only a nod. This is modern Deism at its best and unfettered capitalism at its worst.

    The secular liturgies with ” a religious theme” played constantly in the temples we call malls and specialty shops numb the mindless disciples who happily and even violently at times seek out the contemporary money changers so that the artificially produced appetite for things can be satisfied. People with a senseless passion grab and hoard item after item “for the children” deceiving themselves into believing such an excuse is an honest explanation for their selfish behavior.

    In the meantime the hungry go hungry, the homeless remain homeless, the sick unattended, the prisoner unliberated, and the dying ignored. One cannot but help think that Mary and Joseph would be wandering the streets and finding no comfort they would find an alley way for the arrival of the Prince who weeps as the hungry weeps and cries as the homeless cry, the Prince who suffers with the sick and grieves with the dying.

    No the real war is the prostitution of a holy day in the name of profit!

    Rev Andrew Gentry

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