End of a war that never was
Christmas in America has just kept getting bigger and bigger
President Trump began declaring victory in the phantom “war on Christmas” even before the 2017 holiday decorations began going up in the stores. “Guess what?” Trump told a gathering at the Values Voters Summit in Washington, D.C., in October. “We’re saying ‘Merry Christmas’ again.”
Sorry, Mr. President, Bill O’Reilly beat you to it. O’Reilly had been bloviating against the so-called war year after year, with unbridled sanctimony, until the Fox News host finally went on “Late Night with Seth Meyers” to declare victory in December 2014.
“I won the ‘war on Christmas,’ ” O’Reilly said. “I’ve been doing this for about 10 years and this is the only year we have not had a store that commanded its employees not to say ‘Merry Christmas.’ ”
Unfortunately for O’Reilly, he lost his platform to remind Americans that he should get the credit. He was forced out of his highly rated show on Fox news after revelations of a cascade of sexual harassment allegations. So much for moral high ground.
Yet with all due respect to Trump and O’Reilly, the genuine general who pre-emptively conquered the war on Christmas was President Ulysses S. Grant, who in June 1870 signed legislation to make Dec. 25 a national holiday. That same bill also designated New Year’s Day and the Fourth of July as holidays, and each remains firmly ingrained in the American tradition, yet neither quite commands the cultural prominence of Christmas. Its footprint on our culture just keeps growing.
(Spoiler alert: Don’t let your young children read the next paragraph.)
For most of us, Christmas has never been quite the same since we stopped believing in Santa Claus. But it’s still a very big deal, even if those grand presents are obtained by credit-card debt instead of the magic of a rotund stranger hurtling from chimney to chimney. Ask yourselves, regardless of age or religion, have you ever gone through a holiday season without getting wished a Merry Christmas multiple times? Some war. Perhaps the most determined assault on Christmas came in the 17th century when the Puritans banned celebrations on the belief that it contradicted their interpretation of the Bible. They obviously lacked the bully pulpit of Fox News.
So the truce endured until radio host John Gibson came out with his 2005 book, “The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought.” O’Reilly, other conservatives and some evangelical leaders quickly took up the call to alarm.
You’ve seen the controversies: over the banning of Nativity scenes at schools or City Halls, over the selection of songs at public schools, over stores that would prefer to greet customers with “Happy Holidays” instead of Merry Christmas. The American Family Association, based in Tupelo, Miss., even has an annual “naughty and nice” list that rates national retailers on how they market to Christmas shoppers.
The triumphant Trump might be chagrined to know that the “naughty list” has not gone away. Among the culprits, you’ll be shocked to know, are Victoria’s Secret and Pet Smart. It just goes to show: It’s not what they sell, it’s all about how they sell it.
And the imaginary war goes on. The war on Christmas seems to have Christmas. been of replaced Who victory will over by claim annual the credit war declarations on next year? Our founding fathers’ reverence for the separation of church and state has guaranteed all along that Christians are free to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ as a holy day, and minimize or outright ignore the commercial appropriation of Christmas. Americans of other faiths, or no religious beliefs at all, are equally free to embrace or bypass Christmas traditions. Retailers are unbound by government edict to decide how to best serve their customers in a pluralistic society. This is truly worth celebrating this holiday season. We close with two words for our readers: Merry Christmas.