Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah and Kwanzaa!

Here is a link to Christmas and Holiday Celebrations at Twiggle Magazine where information and materials are supplied so as to be able to celebrate the three opposing religious holidays together.

Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah and Kwanzaa! Whatever!

The same kind of greeting can be heard from radio talk show hosts and other program hosts. A nondescript “Happy Holidays!” can be heard from bank tellers and in most stores.

What is the point?

This crotchety and cynical video seems to express the nondescript mixture rather accurately:



Well, most people who use the “Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah and Kwanzaa!” greeting intend to set a more positive tone of nothingness, but does it really have a more positive influence? After all, it is still the proclamation of WHATEVER!

Why even bother to celebrate “Whatever”?

What is being celebrated? What does the greeting mean?

If one says, “Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah and Kwanzaa!” is this not the same as declaring that whichever of these that people celebrate is really a meaningless expression of wishful thinking and hoping for goodwill among those who have nothing in common?

Actually, from the perspective of the vast nebula of modern religiosity and perceived spirituality these have much more in common than I want to admit. From the “religion equals tradition and tolerance” perspective these three “holidays” are essentially the same. Consider how these sites define Hanukkah and Kwanzaa at the Jewish Outreach Institute and the Official Kwanzaa
Web Site:

Hanukkah

Kwanzaa: Roots and Branches

From the twinkle of the Christmas lights and the sense of “Ho! Ho! Ho!” and the many songs on the radio and the stores that sing of “good cheer” and “there’s no place like home for the holidays,” and “Silver Bells,” etc.

Well, whatever, then. For anyone who prefers such empty tidings, “Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah and Kwanzaa!” is very fitting. A little cheer, a little booze, a big meal or two or three, a gathering of relatives, and then back to “whatever.”

But for the record, for those who crave something substantial, for those who realize that superficial facades are not enough, God offers more, much more. He offers the Christ Mass, where the babe born to a virgin in the House of Bread, Bethlehem, born the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, gives Himself to us in this age even as He came two millennia ago, in flesh and blood for our salvation. He suffered and died and gave His body to be scourged and poured out His blood that our sins and the consequences of our sins would be removed from our account forevermore, setting us free to be baptized into His Kingdom of righteousness and everlasting blessedness. That same body and blood is given in the Christ Mass so that what was accomplished once and for all long ago may be applied to us even now.

This is not “whatever.” This is “Hosanna in the Highest! Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord” It is also as the angels proclaimed, “Glory be to God on High and on earth, peace, goodwill toward men!”

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