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This is the time of the year when it gets a little crazy. The shopping list always includes some that are nearly impossible to buy for. And of course you have the concern that you will forget someone. Or the biggest  fear might be that a person who delivers a gift to you and you have a big bag of nothing for them. I was thinking this morning about someone that we (Christians) almost always acknowledge at Christmas but often neglect to think about what we are giving him. That person is the birthday boy himself…Jesus.

I was thinking about what I could give Jesus in the middle of the brouhaha over his birthday. I wondered how the Lord would react to some of the tactics that are being used in his name?  I came across some quotes from Barry Lynn, the Executive Director for Americans United for the Separation of Church and State in an open letter to Jerry Falwell.

“Since I debated you (Jerry Falwell) about the Christmas issue on Fox News Channel’s “O’Reilly Factor,” I have received 66 nasty e-mails, including two death threats. Observed one of my correspondents, “Hope you die soon. Merry Christmas.”

Lynn also noted that after a public school in New York made news for its holiday observance policies, “some education officials there received hateful mail of all sorts. One e-mail said “You are either bigoted Jews who hate Christians or mindless secularists.”

Barry Lynn and I disagree on many, if not most, issues. But I do not wish any ill to befall him. I don’t assume (as I mentioned in my December 9th post) that educators have any evil agendas when they set policies for Christmas.

I wish I could develop a grace check software program for any Christian who sends out a letter or email. Any ugly names or phrases or stereotypes would be rejected. The grace check feature would allow Biblical truth to be communicated clearly and forcefully but would remove all vindictive and insensitive language. I would love to add an intelligence module that would help writers have a point, use actual grammar, and make sure the spelling was better than the Chik-fil-a cow billboards.

Mr.Lynn notes writes in his letter to Mr.Falwell…

“The First Amendment of our Constitution ensures every American’s right to observe religious holidays or to refrain from doing so. We can wish each other a “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Holidays,” and it’s really none of your business which term we choose. We can call our decorated tree a “Christmas tree” or a “holiday tree,” and that’s our right. (We can observe the holidays of other traditions as well.)”

You certainly can. I don’t think that is the issue. But I also have a right to spend my money at a store that calls the tree a “Christmas” tree and notes that it is Christmas in their advertising and signage. That is my right of free expression as an American. Perhaps we have two different debates going here. One is my rights as an American, the other revolves around my responsibility as a follower of Christ. As a Christian my rules of engagement should be clear.

Every person has value in the eyes of the one who’s birthday is being debated. No one should be condemned or judged by me. I should represent the love of Christ to those I disagree with and demonstrate His amazing grace when they turn less than civil. It is supernatural responses that draw people to Jesus. When Christians respond with angry and ugly diatribes the message is lost and the cause is damaged.

Mr.Lynn continues…

“I think we all know what’s really going on with your campaign. You (Falwell) want an America where there is no separation of church and state and where your rather narrow interpretation of Christianity is forced on everyone. If you can convince Americans that their cherished Christmas traditions are under fire, you think maybe they will join your nefarious crusade to tear down the protective church-state wall that guarantees our freedoms.”

I can’t speak for Mr.Falwell and I certainly wish that people would quit assuming that he speaks for me. But I can tell you that I do not want an America where my interpretation of Christianity is forced on everyone. You see, my interpretation of Christianity cannot be forced on anyone. I gladly share the Jesus that has changed my life. What you do with that is up to you. A relationship like that cannot be forced. 

Sorry for getting a bit sidetracked. Tomorrow I will give you my gift list for Jesus on His birthday. There are still plenty of shopping days left.

 

On December 9th I posted a story about the decision by a Wisconsin elementary school to rewrite the lyrics of “Silent Night” to make it acceptable for the winter program. The unfortunate choice for a new title was “Cold in the Night”. Some things just shouldn’t be done. It is like the old Jim Croce song…”you don’t tug on Superman’s cape, you don’t spit into the wind, you don’t pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger, and you don’t rewrite Silent Night” (New Revised Version).

Writing that post brought to mind a legend I had heard involving the song “Silent Night” and a wartime Christmas truce. I researched the story and found that it actually happened. Here is a nice Christmas story for your Christmas season to share at Christmas gatherings this Christmas Day (was that too obvious?).

The year was 1914 and soldiers were having to spend Christmas Eve night on the battlefields of France during World War I — the Great War, as it was called. After only four months of fighting, more than a million men had already perished in the bloody conflict. The bodies of dead soldiers were scattered between the trenches. Enemy troops were dug-in so close that they could easily exchange shouts.

On December 24, 1914, in the middle of a freezing battlefield in France, a miracle happened.

The British troops watched in amazement as candle-lit Christmas trees began to appear above the German trenches. The glowing trees soon appeared along the length of the German front.

Henry Williamson, a young soldier with the London Regiment wrote in his diary: “From the German parapet, a rich baritone voice had begun to sing a song I remembered my German nurse singing to me…. The grave and tender voice rose out of the frozen mist. It was all so strange… like being in another world — to which one had come through a nightmare.”

Silent Night

Holy Night

A man named John McCutcheon recently wrote a song about the nearly unknown incident. These lyrics are from his work called “Christmas in the Trenches”.

The cannon rested silent, the gas clouds rolled no more,

As Christmas brought us respite from the war….

“They finished their carol and we thought that we ought to retaliate,” another British soldier wrote, “So we sang The First Noël and when we finished, they all began clapping. And they struck up O Tannebaum and on it went… until we started up O Come All Ye Faithful [and] the Germans immediately joined in …. this was really a most extraordinary thing — two nations both singing the same carol in the middle of a war.”

McCutcheon’s lyrics continue…

“There’s someone coming towards us!” the front-line sentry cried.

All sights were fixed on one lone figure trudging from their side.

His truce flag, like a Christmas star, shone on that plain so bright

As he, bravely, strode unarmed into the night.

It is recorded that enemy soldiers greeted each other in the no man’s land that was a killing zone on December 23rd. The soldiers wished each other Merry Christmas and agreed not to fire their rifles on Christmas Day. The spontaneous cease-fire eventually embraced much of a 500-mile stretch of the Western Front. According to the reports of soldiers at the scene, hundreds of thousands of soldiers celebrated the birth of the Prince of Peace among the bodies of their dead.

Soon one by one on either side walked into No Man’s Land.

With neither gun nor bayonet, we met there hand to hand.

Other soldiers told of how the “enemies” exchanged badges and buttons from their uniforms. Others shared photos of wives and children and some even exchanged addresses and promised to write after the war ended. The German troops rolled out barrels of dark beer and the British reciprocated with offerings of plum pudding. Some soldiers produced soccer balls and a spirited match broke out as fellow soldiers shouted encouragement.

At one location along the front the men who just the day before sought to kill one another now gathered together to bury their dead. Together, with heads uncovered, they held a service to memorialize their fallen comrades. A solitary voice began to sing Silent Night, in French. He was joined by another voice — this one singing in German — the words of a Christmas song known and beloved by all.

But the miracle of peace was temporary. Slowly, under threats from their officers, the troops returned to the trenches and the recoils of rifles split the temporary “Silent Night.” Some soldiers admitted aiming so their bullets flew well above the heads of the “enemy.”

Soon daylight stole upon us and France was France once more.

With sad farewells, we each prepared to settle back to war.

But the question haunted every heart that lived that wondrous night:

“Whose family have I fixed within my sight?”

My name is Francis Tolliver, in Liverpool I dwell.

Each Christmas come since World War I, I’ve learned its lesson well:

That the ones who call the shots won’t be among the dead and lame,

And on each end of the rifle, we’re the same.

That is the message the Prince of Peace brought to us on Christmas long ago. Perhaps those of us who celebrate the birth of the Saviour could learn a lesson from this Christmas miracle. Those on the other side of the cultural trenches are not unlike us. We are the same. The message delivered in Bethlehem was peace and goodwill toward men. When we fight the cultural war remember that the whole purpose of Jesus invading our space and time was to love and ultimately die for those on both sides of the battle.

 

 

I did a rare thing for me. With the charming Mrs. Burchett at my side we braved opening day crowds to see the “Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe”. I am a fan of the writing of C.S.Lewis and the Narnia series. My fear was that the producers would stray from the story and the message. They did not. The movie is beautifully shot, the human characters well cast, and the magical figures of Narnia imaginatively portrayed. I loved the movie. I recommend it highly to anyone and especially to fans of the Narnia tales.

On Sunday I browsed online to see how the movie was faring at the box office. The opening projections were very strong and at the site I noticed a link for an online review. I am always curious to compare my reactions to the critics. I have generally found that they genuinely deserve the title of “critic”. Frankly I would not want to party with some of these people. But I clicked on a review by a writer named Scott Holleran. The title for his review was “Literary Fantasy Adaptation is Christian Tract”. I suspected the review would not be glowing. Here are some of Holleran’s descriptions of the plot. My comments are italicized.

“fanciful Christian propaganda…” (it is simply the book on screen…if a film portrayal of a book is propaganda then I guess they are guilty)

“Up until not, Lucy is a nice kid, but, like the movie, she grows less benign as she personifies the self-abnegation theme.” (uhhh…self-abnegation was not something I regularly discuss…primarily because I have no idea what it means. I realize the rest of you know that self-abnegation means renunciation of your own interests in favor of the interests of others. Many English speaking people would simply say self-denial)

“The story remains intact, such as it is, with Narnians prattling on about a prophecy and someone named Aslan…” (they were prattling about the most important character in the book…)

“all Aslan seems to do is negotiate with the enemy and sacrifice himself.” (some would call his act heroic and selfless)

“Narnia stands for death, destruction, and renunciation of self in a poorly disguised Christian fairy tale.” (My take…Narnia stands for good ultimately triumphing over evil, the consequences of sin, and the incomparable love that would give up your life for another in a clearly enunciated Christian allegory).

At this point I really wasn’t sure if we saw the same movie. The movie faithfully reflects the book. It is not a Christian “tract” or “fanciful Christian propaganda”. The movie tells the story of four children in the land of Narnia. It is exactly what fans of the book series expect. This production is no different than what the fans of Harry Potter expect when those books are made into films. I decided to see if Mr.Holleran had addressed faith at other times.

In February of 2004 he wrote about Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” and he flippantly entitled the piece “Jesus Christ Superscar.”  Without having seen the movie (by his own admission) Holleran deduced that the movie’s theme is that suffering, not joy, is man’s proper fate. Again, I apparently saw an entirely different movie. Gibson’s message (and the Gospel message) is that man’s proper fate was mitigated by the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. I saw the movie as a movie of hope although, admittedly,  the suffering of Jesus was difficult to watch. Later Holleran describes the movie as being “religion for what it is – – abject misery here on earth.” Actually on this point Holleran and I agree. That is a consequence of religion. But, at the considerable risk of intellectual scorn, I am convinced that is why the message of Jesus is different. Jesus talked about relationship and not religion. Love and not law. Grace and not condemnation. Perhaps Scott Holleran has never witnessed that type of follower of Christ. Maybe his contempt of all people of faith would blind him to the possiblity of such a relationship. I wish he could get to know some Christians I have been privileged to know. Holleran would likely not change his worldview but I think he would realize his bitterness toward all Christians is unfair and even bigoted.

Holleran’s final quote is honest and I respect him for that. “Whether the besieged culture is ready to renounce reason, yield to faith, and submit to suffering does not depend on Mel Gibson’s fundamentally religious movie.But his box office success, especially for those of us who are infidels, may offer an ominous sneak preview.” 

I am saddened by the presumptions that Holleran makes about my faith. I would not call him an infidel for not believing as I do. I don’t feel a need to “convert” him or “argue” with him about my faith. I don’t believe you have to renounce reason to embrace Christianity. I did not enter into my faith relationship with some deep seated need or desire to suffer. And I don’t think that my worldview is ominous to self-described infidels. I wish that I could sit down with people like Scott Holleran and talk. Maybe he would realize I am not such an idiot. And maybe I would understand his disdain for religion. I doubt we could get any further apart and maybe, just maybe, we could find some common ground of intellectual respect. Hey, it is the season of miracles.

I love Christmas. It is my favorite time of the year for sentimental and spiritual reasons. I love the lights and the stories and the music. Especially the music. I love everything from “O Holy Night” to “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer.”  

I know…I need help.

There has always been something special to me about Christmas music. So it was with a bit of bemused sadness that I read about the rewriting of “Silent Night” to make it acceptable for an elementary school program. A Wisconsin school altered the song to become “Cold in the Night” for it’s winter program. The lyrics were changed to the following:

Cold in the night,

 no one in sight,

winter winds whirl and bite,

how I wish I were happy and warm,

safe with my family out of the storm.

 

When I was a kid there were Santas all over town. Now there are lawyers on every corner. Maybe I could adapt my own song for the current battle over Christmas to be sung to the tune of “Silver Bells.”

 

City lobbies…
Busy bodies…
Dressed in holiday style
In the air there’s a flurry of lawsuits.

 

People griping
Talk shows sniping
Who’s offended today?
And on every street corner you hear

 

Lawyer’s Bells, Lawyer’s Bells,
It’s “Winter” time in the city
Ring-a-ling, skeptics sing
This must be called “Holidays”.

 

No Baby Jesus
You must please us
Cause we might take offense
If the name of the season is spoken.

 

We’re in danger
Lose that manger
You’ve infringed on our rights
And above all this bustle you hear

 

Lawyer’s Bells, Lawyer’s Bells,
It’s “Winter” time in the city
Ring-a-ling, PC is king
You must all say “Holidays”.

 

Okay, I will stay with my day job. Back to our “Silent Night” rewrite, Mathew Staver, Liberty Counsel president and general counsel said in a statement. “When a public school intentionally mocks Christian Christmas songs by secularizing their content, they cross the line from a neutral position, which the Constitution requires, to a hostile position, which the Constitution forbids.”

 

I am not sure that I would go so far as Mr. Staver. I don’t believe that the intent was to intentionally “mock” Christian Christmas songs and I doubt the purpose was overtly hostile. I suspect it was simply fear of lawsuits run amuck. It only takes one “offendee” to make life miserable for a school district. My conversations with most educators seems to indicate that fear more than conviction drives these decisions to make the programs formerly known as Christmas into generic winter don’t offend anyone events. 

 

When these stories become public many secularists hope that Christians will get hysterical. That reinforces the stereotype of people of faith. I hope that Christians will be gentle, informed, and intelligent in our defense. What I am looking for in the public arena is a level playing field. What is good for the Christian goose should be applied to the other ganders. Uneven treatment of Christians over other faiths is what raises my blood pressure. But I have determined that none of this is going to steal my Christmas joy. Because I believe that it was a bit more than just a “Cold Night” in Bethlehem. It was a holy night and the original lyrics sum it up quite well.

 

Silent night, holy night
Son of God, love’s pure light
Radiant beams from thy holy face
With the dawn of redeeming grace
Jesus Lord, at thy birth
Jesus Lord, at thy birth

 

Redeeming grace. What a gift I was given on Christmas day! Keeping with our lyrical theme I finish with a little line from Gershwin that I am relating here to the miracle of that birth on Christmas and the battle over that message.

 

The way You change my life
No, no they can’t take that away from me.

 

 

The Catalogue for Philanthropy just released their 2005 Charitable Giving Index. Some of the data is intriquing. Their methodology is outlined at their website. (http://www.catalogueforphilanthropy.org/cfp/generosity_index/faq.html)

Using published data of individual tax returns from the Internal Revenue Service, we compare the rank of each state’s average adjusted gross income (AAGI) to the rank of each state’s average itemized charitable deductions (AICD). The arithmetical differences between these two rankings are then themselves ranked, resulting in the Generosity Index rank.

The top three states in adjusted gross income were Connecticut, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. How do they fare in the Generosity Index? Connecticut ranked 45th, New Jersey 48th, and Massachusetts ranked 49th when the study compared per capita giving versus income.

According to this index you might want to set up your charitable outreach somewhere other than New Hampshire. The Granite State’s ranks of 8th wealthiest and 48th in giving combined to land them at number 50 on the list.

Conversely, the most generous states were not the ones with the most income or national prestige. Mississippi ranks dead last in average adjusted gross income in the United States. But the giving rank (a ranking of the average donations) for Mississippians was 6th in the country! That level of generosity put Mississippi at the top of the list. The top ten states in generosity after Mississippi were Arkansas, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Alabama, Louisiana, Utah, South Carolina, and West Virginia.

The top 25 most generous states are part of the political red sea that is the butt of national jokes. After you sort through the red neck jokes and wisecracks about the plains and tasteless humor about the South you will find the most generous people in the nation. I knew that before I read this index. My state of Texas fared quite well by finishing as the 12th most generous state but with the 4th highest giving rank.  

The first of the “Blue” states to show up was New York at number 26 in the Generosity Index. I don’t want to make this another Red/Blue harangue but the take away for me is that stereotypes don’t work. The idea that the blue states are generally more socially conscious and caring because of their ideology simply doesn’t play out in reality. Many of the most giving people are the ones ridiculed and demeaned by the media and cultural elite.

Not much has changed in the past couple of millenia as Jesus observed in the Gospel of Mark.

   He continued teaching. “Watch out for the religion scholars. They love to walk around in academic gowns, preening in the radiance of public flattery, basking in prominent positions, sitting at the head table at every church function. And all the time they are exploiting the weak and helpless. The longer their prayers, the worse they get. But they’ll pay for it in the end.”

    Sitting across from the offering box, he was observing how the crowd tossed money in for the collection. Many of the rich were making large contributions. One poor widow came up and put in two small coins–a measly two cents. Jesus called his disciples over and said, “The truth is that this poor widow gave more to the collection than all the others put together. All the others gave what they’ll never miss; she gave extravagantly what she couldn’t afford–she gave her all.”   Mark 12  The Message

The average church attendee gives a paltry 2.6% of total income according to the Christian research group empty tomb, inc. So before we get too carried away by state pride or red state power we might meditate a bit on the Gospel of Mark. If evangelical Christians alone would simply tithe we could generate another 80 billion per year. Can you imagine what could be done with that kind of money? Many of us are generous at Christmas. But the truth of God’s Word is sobering.

From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.  Luke 12  NIV

Followers of Jesus need to step it up year round. I have been given much. I can do more. I suspect you can as well.

 

 

Today’s blog is opening the electronic mailbag to answer some questions and respond to comments.

• Question from Scott and many others. “What is a blog?” Blog is short for weblog. A weblog is a journal (or newsletter) that is frequently updated and intended for general public consumption. Blogs generally represent the personality of the author or the Web site. Authoring a blog, maintaining a blog or adding an article to an existing blog is called “blogging”. Individual articles on a blog are called “blog posts”, “posts”, or “entries”. The person who posts these entries is called a “blogger”.
  
• During my post about Peter Singer on Thursday, December 1st I offered membership in an organization to be called “The Rumps of the Know-Nothings”. That was a response to the description that Mr. Singer used to categorize religious people who hold onto outdated views of the sanctity of life. The bad news…only courageous reader Steve has joined my new organization. The good news…it will be easy to find a venue large enough for our meetings.
  
• Continuing with Mr.Singer I appreciate the clarification by reader Jonathon about Singer’s views on infanticide. Jonathon points out that Singer does not advocate infanticide in his book Practical Ethics if the parents want the baby. Jonathon did not seem to understand that the baby described in the post was my daughter. It is hard to imagine how conflicted your emotions are unless you have been there. I still believe that Singer’s philosophy would have leaned toward euthanizing my daughter because she took money and resources better used on children with a chance for personhood. I would argue that he has adopted the escape clause as a stepping stone to his overall vision that the sanctity of life is related to potential to contribute to society. I appreciate the clarity but remain terrified of the implications of his thinking.
  
• Reader Bridgette wondered about the reaction to the article in the Dallas Morning News entitled 10 ideas on the way out. The articles was the subject of posts on December 1st and 2nd. She was curious how such such controversial predictions would play in our little old Bible belt red state. The reaction was predictable. Many were outraged by the content but others were more perplexed by the people chosen to address those views. I suppose the purpose was to stir debate and controversy. Perhaps someday a blogger will dig out these predictions and see how they fared. I pray they were dreadfully wrong.
  
• Bridgette also pointed out an interesting website (www.jews4fairness.org) that defends Christians in the culture war. Check it out.
  
• The war over Christmas is giving me tired head.

 

 

There has been a politically correct Christmas greeting that has circulated the internet for the past couple of years.

Best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most joyous traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, but with respect for the religious persuasion of others who choose to practice their own religion as well as those who choose not to practice a religion at all.

Perhaps that should be adopted as official “safe“ greeting for retailers this Christmas season. Target has been widely vilified for allegedly forbidding their employees from saying Merry Christmas. It turns out that was not exactly true. The story is now widely circulated and it has become another example of how too many Christians leap before we look in response to cultural issues. Please, please, please verify every email and petition for validity before you hit send.

What Target has done is cleansed their website of every Christmas reference. They even list shipping deadlines to get gifts to their destination by the 25th. Target can’t even bring themselves to identify that day as Christmas. I find it all an odd mix of amusing and confusing and maddening.

I suppose you can make an argument for the separation of church and state although in practice the goal seems to be the amputation of church and state. But for retailers to wrap Christmas in a brown paper wrapper like it is offensive material makes no sense to me.

When I move into a culture I don’t expect the entire populace to change for me. Perhaps I should and this will be my test case. I grew up in Ohio as an avid Cleveland Browns fan. Being a Browns fan is a chronic disease for which there is no known cure. When I moved to Dallas I was immediately offended by the aggressive Dallas Cowboy fans. Cowboy stuff was everywhere including in the public square. Politicians endorsed the Cowboys. Cowboy zealots tried to proselytize me to become a Cowboy fan. They inferred that having faith in the Browns made me a second class citizen. The Cowboys were clearly the football religion of the state and the iconography was everywhere. I was offended.

Now I believe that my rights as a Browns fan are being violated. I fear my kids exposure to the Cowboys star will cause them to be Cowboys fans. I am greatly offended when I go to the mall and somebody says, “How ‘bout dem Boys”! I want all stores to simply display “Go NFL Teams” signs and greet me with a “Happy Football” greeting…no more exclusionary “Go Cowboys” language. 

Silly isn’t it? But is the Christmas argument any different? I am all for being inclusive. Have a Hannukah display. Put up a Kwanza sign. Throw in Happy Holidays for the atheists and agnostics and people of other faiths. But mix in a Merry Christmas. The holiday is called Christmas.

For the most part Christmas has become an economic and not a religious holiday. There are so many icons like Santa Claus and Rudolph and the Grinch that are not at all related to the religious aspect of the Holiday. I just find it hard to comprehend the argument that a nativity scene or a Merry Christmas sign is oppressive in this vast landscape of Holiday icons.

Oddly one of the most powerful reminders of the Christian importance of Christmas comes from the genius of the late Charles Schultz. His classic show A Charlie Brown Christmas has a simple, elegant, and classic message. Charlie Brown has failed miserably in his attempt to find the true meaning of Christmas. But then Linus reads the following passage from the King James version of the Bible.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.  And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

And then Linus says to Charlie Brown, “That’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.”

Amen. And by the way….Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas.