Reading Time: 10 minutes In the past few decades, Christians’ attempted stranglehold on Christmas has receded further with each bit of dominance lost by their tribe. Now, finally, people are embracing the real reasons for the season.
Christmas
Posted inPolitics
Conservatives are upset their kids don’t want to spend Christmas with them
Reading Time: 4 minutes In an essay that inspired unintentional laughter all over social media, right-wing commentator Dennis Prager expressed deep concern about how so many conservatives are no longer welcome in their kids’ homes over Christmas because of their politics. Probably an unprecedented number of Americans with grown children will be alone this Christmas because their children will […]
Posted inFilm/TV
The five Christmas films you meet in hell
Reading Time: 15 minutes How can one properly make a list of bad Christmas films? Is it even possible? When I took on the task of narrowing down a list of films that soften your brain and have the audacity to call it Christmas spirit, I had assumed that certain films would stand out from the rest. I assumed […]
Posted inCulture
Keeping the merry in Christmas. Humanism in the cold of winter
Reading Time: 4 minutes I understand the inclusive spirit of saying “Happy Holidays.” But holidays are still “holy days,” which leaves out the non-religious. At any rate, what we need most in the dark of winter is mirth and merriment. The cheerful exuberance of making merry is not the sedate joy of Christian salvation. Rather, it’s the laughter of […]
Posted inPsychology
How my grasp of consent nearly torpedoed my 3rd grade Christmas pageant
Reading Time: 7 minutes The teachers organizing our elementary school’s Christmas pageant expected me to do something humiliating. My refusal sparked a crisis.
Their fatal mistake was calling my mother.
Posted inMusic
THE great secular Christmas song: ‘White Wine in the Sun’
Reading Time: < 1 minute There’s no better expression of the secular spirit of Christmas than Tim Minchin’s “White Wine in the Sun.” Enjoy.
Posted inCulture
Are my children missing out on ‘True Christmas’?
Reading Time: 3 minutes I am a fully-fledged secular atheist. I also love Christmas. It is probably a learned thing involving decades of cultural normalization following a childhood ensconced in an at least nominally Christian Christmas tradition. What I mean by this is that I, like many people of my era, spent Christmases at school singing carols and hymns, […]
Posted inThe Secular
The Bill of Rights is the baby in the manger
Reading Time: 3 minutes It’s that time of year again. Red and green decorations dominate the landscape. Mariah has come out of her 11-month hibernation to serenade us with her Christmas carols. Time again to trade cookies with the neighbors and to watch a decked out pine tree die slowly in the living room. Jesus is hard to miss […]
Posted inReligion
How did the Star of Bethlehem move like Tinker Bell?
Reading Time: 6 minutes The most unexplainable part of the Star of Bethlehem story (found only in Matthew) is it moving like a firefly to lead the magi to the baby Jesus
Posted inLeaving Religion
Not so much better angels: Celebrating with the ghosts of Christmas past
Reading Time: 3 minutes Despite Catholicism lurking in the background, Christmas was a magical time when I was a kid. Jesus was watching but from a respectful distance. Even when my old aunties came to visit, he kept quiet. Well mostly. He apparently insisted we give him thanks for our meals and upper-middle-class lifestyle in sunny 1980s Southern California. […]