MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM AN ATHEIST AND A THOUGHT FOR THE HOLIDAY BASHERS: YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE A PURITAN TO BE PURITANICAL

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*** ORBUSMAX GUEST OP/ED *** MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM AN ATHEIST AND A THOUGHT FOR THE HOLIDAY BASHERS: YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE A PURITAN TO BE PURITANICAL - By Dan Brown December 25, 2003 CHRISTMAS TIME is here, by golly; disapproval would be folly…. So wrote Tom Leherer, the Harvard Mathematician who moonlighted as a satirical songwriter and singer back in the 1950's. In his ditty, Dr Leherer lampooned the commercialism of Christmas, but not the Holiday itself. Disapproval would, after all, be folly…. Sadly, folly seems to be more popular today than then. I'm an Atheist. I put no more stock in Yahweh than Zeus. And I'm moderately competent at understanding the English language, as in "Congress shall make NO law respecting an establishment of religion, OR prohibiting the free exercise thereof…" I know what "no" means. Americans have the right, within very broad limits, to practice any religion, or no religion. But there is, I think, a crucial void in the pseudointellectual debates about the intent of those long-dead authors, the debates about the "rights" of the individual: "Rights" be damned; rights are worthless without obligations, without civility, without all those things that are not a part of law but rather a part of civilization. Put simply, it's rude to put your "rights" ahead of other people's traditions as long as those traditions do you no material harm. Certainly, Christmas is a religious holiday. But it's more than just a celebration of the birth of a man many believe to be the son of a God. If it were just a commemoration, it wouldn't even be celebrated in December. In the twenty centuries since the event, Christmas has grown; it has embraced the symbols of many peoples and in the process it has come to embody "the hopes and fears of all the years." The story of Christmas is an inextricable part of the larger story of the civilization of the human race, a story with many dark passages punctuated by the celebration of ideals that make life worthwhile. We are the descendants and benefactors of people who, by our standards, lived miserable lives, people who had little cause for joy but were nevertheless joyful. The men and women who wrote most of the carols and created most of the traditions we call "Christmas" could make joy out of nothing. It's a sad commentary that today there are all too many people that can make misery out of anything. What does it matter if the next man recites a prayer at a public assembly or erects a crèche in the Town Square? What reasonable person can claim to be harmed by such? How can the puritanical minority with good conscience cloak this issue in the language of law? Nowhere in my copy of the Constitution do I find the words "You have the right not to be offended." And what kind of man can find offense in the beauty of these traditions in any case? Only those who are blind to beauty itself. So, celebrate the season whether you accept the "deeper meanings" or not. Celebrate the victory of love over hate, of life over death. Let the raucous sleighbells jingle, hail our dear old friend Kris Kringle… Riding his Reindeer across the sky… But don't stand underneath when they fly by…

----------------------------------------------------------- Dan Brown is a Materials Management Chemist, a graduate of the Evergreen State College, and of the University of Adversity.