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08 Dec 2008 10:45 am
An Atheist Christmas, Ctd.
By Patrick Appel
A reader writes:
On Sam Harris's point:
"It seems to me to be obvious that everything we value in Christmas — giving gifts, celebrating the holiday with our families, enjoying all of the kitsch that comes along with it — all of that has been entirely appropriated by the secular world," [Sam Harris] said, "in the same way that Thanksgiving and Halloween have been."
Sam Harris' knowledge of history must not stretch back much further than the 1950s, as this statement is categorically wrong.
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As a religious holiday, pre-modern Christmases were rather austere
celebrations defined by lengthy church services. That this coincided
with pagan culture's raucous celebrations of the winter solstice was a
source of great displeasure to institutional Christianity for
centuries. The "kitsch" that Harris discusses (Evergreen Trees, the
man from the north who brings us goodies) are pagan icons. Giving
gifts and spending time with your family and friends (instead of
spending the day in mass) are also holdovers from popular tradition of
drinking and reveling which the church had been actively hostile to.
In short, everything WE secularists value in Christmas has been entirely appropriated by the Christian world.
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