Fri Feb 10 2012
Departments
National Issues

Which Christmas is the 'War Against Christmas' against?
by Robert Lockwood Mills
December 25, 2005

Sometime around 1850 my great-grandmother’s second cousin, James Lord Pierpont, wrote a song that for more than a century has been sung the most often in celebration of Christmas, especially by children. The song is “Jingle Bells.” A quick glance at its lyrics, however, reveals that Pierpont never once mentioned Christmas. “Jingle Bells” merely describes a winter scene and people frolicking in the snow, possibly on Washington’s Birthday (no, make that Presidents Day).

Pierpont came from a religious family. His father, Rev. John Pierpont (the grandfather for whom financier J. Pierpont Morgan was named), was a prominent abolitionist preacher in Massachusetts during the antebellum period. Rev. Pierpont preached about slavery to the exclusion of spiritual and theological questions, and for this sin was fired from his pulpit at Boston’s Hollis Church by a frustrated congregation. He lived out his life as a Civil War nurse and died in poverty soon afterward. Ironically, one of his sons, Rev. John Pierpont, Jr., moved to Charleston, South Carolina where he became a Confederate sympathizer. James Lord Pierpont settled in Savannah, Georgia, where he was a church organist and shared his brother’s pro-South proclivities.

The fact of a song having nothing to do with Christmas becoming the most popular of the Christmas season is of a piece with the current “war on Christmas” being cited and fought against by a coalition of high-profile fundamentalist clergymen and right-wing media personnel. Which Christmas is it that Rev. Jerry Falwell and Bill O’Reilly seek to protect from attack? Is it the religious celebration, which in James Lord Pierpont’s day included no department stores, no Santa Claus, and mostly homemade gifts? Or is it the latter-day Christmas of shopping malls, of intense advertising appeals to good old American greed and materialism…a Christmas that has actually become crucial to the very survival of a consumer-driven economy?

Pierpont never dreamed that his song would become associated with Christmas. In fact, he thought so little of “Jingle Bells” that he never copyrighted it. Only on his deathbed in 1893 did a thoughtful niece convince Uncle James that his song’s popularity warranted legal action to protect his authorship. By that time Clement Moore’s poem, A Visit from St. Nicholas (not The Night Before Christmas), had taken hold in American culture. From Moore’s poem came a focus on Santa Claus as the sine qua non of the Christmas spirit, a fiction intensified by an 1897 newspaper editorial that reassured a girl identified only as “Virginia” that indeed Santa Claus was real, if only as the embodiment of all that was right with Christmas…love of family, good cheer, generosity of spirit.

Except Santa Claus had already begun his transformation from European folk legend to American promotional phenomenon. At the dawn of the 20th century the United States was emerging from a long economic depression. Its optimism about the future was buoyed by technological innovation…electronic gizmos, cars, airplanes, radio. Inevitably, consumerism expanded as a staple of daily life, and Christmas, the date of which had been incorrectly placed near the winter solstice in the 4th century by pagan tradition (Jesus was almost certainly born in the springtime), now became an end-of-the-year opportunity for retailers and their advertisers to “make the yearly numbers.” Santa Clauses of every conceivable shape and character began to appear in department store lobbies, in Thanksgiving Day parades, and throughout the popular media…indeed, anywhere they could be used as a device to sell something.

With Rev. John Pierpont having died, with the abolition of slavery obviated by the Civil War, and with a Gilded Age acquisitiveness becoming firmly entrenched in American life, clergymen began to preach against the commercialization of Christmas. “Think of the Christ child at Christmas, not of receiving presents, if you really want to feel the Christmas spirit..” went the refrain. It rang true, but the moral lesson never sufficed for even worshipful Christians to resist the pull of popular culture, and especially the needs of their children to satisfy what Clement Moore had called “visions of sugar plums (dancing) in their heads” on Christmas Eve.

The homogenization of society in the 20th century meant Jewish children, for whose families Christmas had no religious meaning, became willing goyim every December, if only to not get left behind when Santa toured their neighborhoods with his treasures. Meanwhile, “White Christmas,” a non-religious song written by a Jewish immigrant from Russia named Irving Berlin, had joined “Jingle Bells” at the top of the seasonal charts. By the mid-20th century, any chance that Christmas would ever return to its antecedents in biblical history was gone.

So what is this “war against Christmas,” anyway? Whom are you fighting against, Rev. Falwell and Mr. O’Reilly? Are you against Santa Claus, because his origins are European? Are you against American retailers, who say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” as a polite gesture to non-Christian customers whose business they, and the American economy, can ill afford to lose? Are you against political correctness, and using a sacred holiday to reiterate a point you already made 20 years ago? Or are you simply acting like Ebenezer Scrooges who haven’t yet had an epiphany?


Recent National Issues Articles

Rumsfeld admits to "ghosting" detainee
  December 30, 2005
  David Swanson

A man without a country
  December 28, 2005
  David Swanson

Impeach the Liar-in-Chief
  December 26, 2005
  Stephen Crockett and Al Lawrence

Bush wiretaps threaten national security
  December 25, 2005
  Stephen Crockett

Which Christmas is the 'War Against Christmas' against?
  December 25, 2005
  Robert Lockwood Mills

Rainbow PUSH Wall Street Project plans economic summit in New York City
  December 22, 2005
  Rainbow PUSH

Fear of the devil
  December 22, 2005
  Robert C. Koehler, Tribune Media Services

It's time to impeach Bush for these blatant violations of the law
  December 22, 2005
  Andy Ostroy

December 3 in the USA: a partial report
  December 22, 2005
  Ted Glick

Bush spews more irresponsible rhetoric as senate Extends Patriot Act for Six Months
  December 22, 2005
  Andy Ostroy

The Constitution in Crisis report
  December 22, 2005
  Edward Chu

Privatize Me...Corporatize Me.... Blackwaterize Me...
  December 20, 2005
  Jason Miller

USA Patriot Act defeated: Libertarians celebrate victory
  December 19, 2005
  Libertarian Party of Ohio

The solution we aren't considering
  December 19, 2005
  David Swanson

Panic attack
  December 15, 2005
  Robert C. Koehler, Tribune Media Services

Eugene McCarthy, prophet with honor
  December 12, 2005
  Robert Lockwood Mills

The iron fist of Jesus
  December 12, 2005
  Jason Miller

Progressive primary challenge to Hilary aunched
  December 6, 2005
  David Swanson

An invitation to a tea party
  December 6, 2005
  Lucinda Marshall

Precarious lives
  December 3, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Criminal trial related to California energy crisis may start soon
  December 3, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Hey board members, leave our kids alone!
  December 3, 2005
  Jason Miller

A Congressman for impeachment
  November 30, 2005
  David Swanson

Friday night Congress: what was that?
  November 23, 2005
  David Swanson

Teach our children well
  November 20, 2005
  Todd Huffman, M.D.

Greenhouse School secures major art donation
  November 18, 2005
  Dan Welch

Parental guidance suggested
  November 16, 2005
  Mike Ferner

Our mothers (and Thomas Paine) warned us about people like the disciples of Strauss
  November 13, 2005
  Jason Miller

Despite his demeanor, Rove's still a Target
  November 13, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Armistice Day 2005
  November 11, 2005
  Stephen Edward Seadler

The Bush-Cheney ethics refresher course
  November 7, 2005
  David Swanson

Vice President lied as White House sought to defuse leak inquiry
  November 7, 2005
  Jason Leopold

53% of Americans support impeachment; ImpeachPAC announced!
  November 5, 2005
  David Swanson

I can't wait
  November 3, 2005
  David Swanson

Nothing to Lose
  November 2, 2005
  Daniel Patrick Welch

The real Rosa Parks
  October 31, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

How has it come to this?
  October 30, 2005
  Jim Oberg

Bush's wheels falling off
  October 30, 2005
  Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.

Miers, White House surrender to ultraconservatives
  October 27, 2005
  Josh Glasstetter

Prosecutor secures indictment in CIA outing case, lawyers say
  October 27, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Hard conversations about the big easy
  October 24, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Coalition of 75 groups demand end to Pentagon's youth database
  October 19, 2005
  Mike Ferner

Vice President's role in outing of CIA agent under examination, sources close to prosecutor say
  October 19, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Hard questions about the big easy
  October 19, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Times reporter entangled in leak case had unusual relationship with military, Iraqi group
  October 19, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Try and catch the wind
  October 17, 2005
  Daniel Patrick Welch

More from the stormfront gulf central
  October 16, 2005
  David Lewis

A deep look at corruption culture
  October 16, 2005
  Stephen Crockett and Al  Lawrence

Dems Go After Bennett, Salem Radio Network, FCC
  October 9, 2005
  David Swanson

Bill Bennett’s comments emerge from an ideology that is classic white supremacy, Rev. Jesse Jackson says
  October 5, 2005
  Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.

Why the nomination of Harriet has to be looked at below the radar
  October 5, 2005
  Cynthia L. Butler, an Attorney licensed in PA, NJ, DC, CA

In support of weakness on national security
  October 3, 2005
  David Swanson

Bill Frist, The Former 2008 Presidential Candidate
  September 27, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Winds of change blow through DC, Bush flees
  September 26, 2005
  Bob Fitrakis

More New Orleans stories
  September 25, 2005
  David Lewis

From the stormfront: experiencing Rita in New Orleans
  September 25, 2005
  David Lewis

The GOP’s fiscal policies turned a natural disaster into a man-made catastrophe
  September 23, 2005
  Jason Leopold

The Devil in the Details: Carter-Baker, California, and the Integrity of American Elections
  September 22, 2005
  Warren Stewart, Director of Legislative Issues and Policy, VoteTrustUSA

Hurricane Katrina-Our Experiences
  September 21, 2005
  Larry Bradshaw, Lorrie Beth Slonsky

A Fraction of Democracy
  September 20, 2005
  Greg Coleridge

Bring back New Orleans: the politics of disaster
  September 20, 2005
  David Lewis, Photos by Aaron Geiser

Rev. Jackson Recommends a 21st Century Marshall Plan That Reinvests in the Gulf Coast
  September 20, 2005
  Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.

Division of funeral corp. charged with desecrating corpses hired to collect deceased victims of hurricane Katrina
  September 19, 2005
  Jason Leopold

FEMA Chief Brown paid millions in false claims to help Bush win Fla. votes
  September 15, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Indefinite Detention
  September 9, 2005
  Daniel Sturm

Seems like more people died than prospered under Pres Bush’s leadership
  September 8, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Politics, timing and the so-called terrorist Nuradin Abdi: the mall bomber who wasn't
  September 7, 2005
  Bob Fitrakis

Paul Allen's other yacht
  September 4, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Katrina: A tragedy made worse
  September 4, 2005
  Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.

The President’s priorities: state of marriage took precedence over state of Louisiana
  September 3, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Notes from inside New Orleans
  September 3, 2005
  Jordan Flaherty

Rev. Jackson Makes Second Rescue Mission into New Orleans
  September 2, 2005
  Rainbow/PUSH Coalition

Bush Strafes New Orleans, Where's Huey Long?
  September 2, 2005
  Greg Palast

911 in New Orleans
  September 2, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Global Warming and Widespread Blackouts Are Just as Deadly as Terrorism
  September 1, 2005
  Jason Leopold

The mothers are coming!
  August 30, 2005
  Sheila Samples

Update from Leonard Peltier
  August 16, 2005
  Leonard Peltier

Leonard has been transferred to USP Lewisburg
  August 16, 2005
  Michael Eckhardt

Against Discouragement
  August 15, 2005
  Howard Zinn

Open Letter to Cindy Sheehan, Crawford, Texas
  August 11, 2005
  Ralph Nader

Regarding the 40th Anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965
  August 4, 2005
  Sabrina Williams

Lawyers, guns and money: Just put down that lawsuit, pardner, and no one gets hurt
  August 1, 2005
  Greg Palast

Forgotten Victims of America’s Plutocracy
  August 1, 2005
  Jason Miller

Spine, spine everywhere a spine
  July 29, 2005
  Rady Ananda

Speaking truth to Roberts
  July 28, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Business as usual with Judge Roberts; straight corporate, with Pepto-Bismol chaser
  July 21, 2005
  Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair

The Record of Judge John Roberts
  July 20, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

The Enemy of Our Enemy May Still Be the Enemy of Democracy
  July 13, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Mr. Rove and the Access of Evil: Tell Us Your "Source," Judy
  July 13, 2005
  Greg Palast

The Economy Turned the Corner and Is Headed in the Wrong Direction
  July 8, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

July 4th Declaration of Impeachment
  July 4, 2005
  Mike Ferner, Veterans for Peace

They Died for Their Country
  July 1, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Energy adviser who solicited Enron to help write national energy policy to be named Chair of FERC
  July 1, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Big Food Strikes Back; Ag industry aims to strip local control of food supplies
  June 26, 2005
  Britt Bailey and Brian Tokar

The fantastical world of Studley McMuffin
  June 25, 2005
  Sheila Samples

Counter-Recruitment: Preventing the Military from Getting More Youth for their Wars: An Interview with Counter-Recruitment Activist Clint Coppernoll
  June 25, 2005
  Kevin Zeese

A matter of education...
  June 23, 2005
  Sheila Samples

Violations of Civil Liberties are an American Tradition
  June 17, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

Rumsfeld: Beyond the Point of No Return
  June 13, 2005
  Gerald Rellick

Peltier hearing to address Lakota Nation soverignty
  June 11, 2005
  Russ Redner and Barry Bachrach

Extraordinarily rancid justices
  June 10, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

Former Army Sec, Enron VP, Thomas White Wants Gov't Funding For New Energy Project
  June 8, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Imposing minority views
  June 8, 2005
  Stephen Crockett

When is Someone Going to Toss Rumsfeld into a Cage?
  June 8, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Republicans: The Anti-Christian, Christian Party
  June 8, 2005
  Stephen Crockett

Watergate Proves That Even Presidents Will Break Laws To Achieve Goals
  June 1, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Oral Histories of the 1970 Kent State Shootings
  May 22, 2005
  Candi Clevenger, Communications Manager, OhioLINK

Blurb: End the filibuster -- in 2015
  May 20, 2005
  Paul Loeb

The Beginning Of The End Of The Age Of Reason
  May 16, 2005
  Todd Huffman, M.D.

Nuking Democracy
  May 14, 2005
  Paul Loeb

Conscientious Objection on Trial: The Court Martial of Keith Benderman
  May 10, 2005
  Kevin B. Zeese

Barnum on Steroids
  May 9, 2005
  Jason Miller

Mother’s Day Without Mom
  May 7, 2005
  Phil Tajitsu Nash

An Open Letter to Howard Dean
  May 5, 2005
  Dennis J. Kucinich

Appeals Court Nominee Janice Rogers Brown Merits the Filibuster
  May 3, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

Activists Spur Historic Call to Exit Iraq
  April 24, 2005
  William Rivers Pitt

John Bolton & the Battle for Reality
  April 24, 2005
  Robert Parry

Videos expose false arrests at 2004 Republican Convention protests in New York
  April 24, 2005
  Peter Daniels

Wal-Mart's Free Market Fallacy
  April 24, 2005
  Jonathan Tasini

Howard Dean Becomes Leader of the Other Pro-War Party; Dean on Iraq: “We're There and We Can't Get Out”
  April 24, 2005
  Kevin Zeese

You have to pick your team
  April 20, 2005
  Sonya Vetra Tinsley, as told to Paul Rogat Loeb

What They Should Fight For
  April 20, 2005
  David Swanson

Vigilante Republicans
  April 13, 2005
  Steven Rosenfeld

Congresswoman Cynthia Mckinney Urges Reform of Voting Process at Historic Conference
  April 12, 2005
  Anna Thompson

Abortion and Schiavo -- The stories we tell
  April 5, 2005
  Paul Rogat Loeb

How and Why We're Working to Block the Bankruptcy Bill
  April 1, 2005
  David Swanson

Statement on the Passing of Terri Schiavo
  March 31, 2005
  Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.

Veterans for peace call for Congressional action to impeach George W. Bush and Richard Cheney
  March 30, 2005
  Veterans For Peace

Zealot and Proud of It
  March 27, 2005
  Jason Miller

Non Volunteers, Non-Recruiters, And A Non War
  March 19, 2005
  Eric Straatsma

Meet Your New FCC Chairman: Kevin Martin
  March 17, 2005
  David Bailey

E.P.A. Nominee Supports Testing of Chemicals on Human Subjects
  March 11, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

A luncheon break with Michael Jackson
  March 11, 2005
  Robert Lockwood Mills

Gannongate and Asian Pacific America
  March 9, 2005
  Phil Tajitsu Nash

I'd rather not say good-bye, Dan
  March 9, 2005
  Greg Palast

Free Trade and Frivolous Lawsuits
  March 7, 2005
  Cyril Mychalejko

Experiencing Hunter, Experiencing Death: A Eulogy
  February 28, 2005
  Tom Luffman

The inevitability trap
  February 18, 2005
  K.C. Golden

Bush’s Judicial Nominations are Hardly Mainstream
  February 17, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

Senators Clinton and Boxer, Representative Tubbs Jones and others unveil major election reform bill
  February 17, 2005
  Offices of Sen. Clinton and Rep. Tubb Jones

The difference between bi-partisanship and non-partisanship
  February 15, 2005
  Robert Lockwood Mills

Bush & the Rise of 'Managed-Democracy'
  February 13, 2005
  Robert Parry

Yesterday's Gallup Poll Showing Bush Approval At 57% Had 9% More Republicans Than Democrats
  February 12, 2005
  Steve Soto

J20 Through my eyes
  February 11, 2005
  Ryan Mishler

Bush's Budget: The War on Working People Continues
  February 11, 2005
  International Action Center staff

Bush’s Budget is at Odds With His Rhetoric
  February 11, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

Direct Action For Peace?
  February 7, 2005
  Bill Scheurer

State of the Union speech falls short, says Rev. Jesse Jackson
  February 3, 2005
  Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition

The Black Perspective
  February 3, 2005
  Judith Powell

Save American Democracy: Curb Corporate Power
  January 29, 2005
  Stephen Crockett

Who's Paying for all this Freedom?
  January 29, 2005
  Darryl Cramer

Yes, there is a crisis in Social Security
  January 29, 2005
  Richard Hayes Phillips, Ph.D.

Agitation Time
  January 25, 2005
  Ted Glick

The 10 Worst Corporations of 2004
  January 25, 2005
  Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman

They Doth Protest Too Little
  January 24, 2005
  Chris Colin

Thousands take to the streets to oppose the inauguration of George W. Bush
  January 24, 2005
  troopsoutnow.org

A Warm Oasis in a Snow Storm; The Progressive Democrat Summit in Washington
  January 24, 2005
  Cynthia L. Butler, Esq.

The Politics of SpongeBob
  January 23, 2005
  Gene C. Gerard

Mis-Defining Terrorism
  January 20, 2005
  John Janney

Marines stretching movement
  January 19, 2005
  Mike Ferner

Bush’s Mythical Mandate and Social Security Piratization
  January 19, 2005
   Stephen Crockett and Al Lawrence

Happy Birthday Martin Luther King, Jr.
  January 16, 2005
  Chuck Zlatkin

Bush’s Choice for Energy Secretary Was One of Texas’ Top Five Worst Polluters
  January 16, 2005
  Jason Leopold

Bush, God, Fox, and the International Criminal Court
  January 13, 2005
  David Swanson

The real reason Bush wants to privatize Social Security
  January 12, 2005
  Robert Lockwood Mills

CBS' cowardice and conflicts behind purge
  January 11, 2005
  Greg Palast

Bring them home -- Sooner rather than later
  January 1, 2005
  Sheila Samples




Read National Issues Articles by Year:
2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000



FREE PRESS EMAIL UPDATE


Donate to The Free Press The Free Press Store

FOLLOW US ON
twitter
facebook


SEARCH THE FREEPRESS




1021 E. Broad St. Columbus, OH 43205 | 614.253.2571 | truth@freepress.org
All content © 1970-2012 The Columbus Free Press
Disclaimer