christians, are stores christmasy enough for you?

Question

i ask this due to this article:

"The American Family Association (AFA) has already targeted two major retailers, saying their holiday catalogs didn't include enough references to Christmas.

Petsmart has come under fire because while there are 252 references to "holiday" items, only 43 of those products contain the word "Christmas". Worse yet, when you look at the "Christmas" tagged merchandise, it's the same stuff that appears under "holiday". Oh, the inhumanity of it all. Home improvment giant Lowe's committed a major faux pas in the eyes of the AFA, because a printing error caused the chain's Christmas trees to be listed in a catalog as "family trees". You can imagine how well this went over. Lowe's jumped in with some quick damage control, however, and notified the AFA that they are "proudly committed to selling Christmas trees this year".

In an interesting side note, conservative icon Pat Robertson reminded his flock on The 700 Club that Christmas trees aren't really Christian at all, but a holdover from the good ol' days of Teutonic paganism, where people "worshipped winter". Robertson was quick to point out that he himself does not, in fact, worship winter.

But I digress. Going back to the fun folks who don't want you to celebrate anything non-Christmasy, apparently there's a big list (.pdf) each year of retailers that shouldn't be shopped at because they don't use the word Christmas in their marketing, or because they ask their employees to be sensitive to the needs of other faiths. The funniest part? The group that puts this list out is called "The Liberty Council".

Answer 1

I find it interesting that as a Christian, my basic liberties and traditions are threatened everyday by the liberals, their media, the ACLU, etc., and I am suppressed in my beliefs because of them. Yet AFA offers a rebuttal to the garbage these establishments dish out and you bleeding hearts come crawling out of the rocks you live under. How come you aren't crying out when some idiot says, "mentioning God in a military funeral is offensive", or "to hear the word Christmas tree offends me?" Why do you people have such a double standard?

It seems you want tolerance for everyone except the ones who go against your beliefs. Hypocrite!

Answer 2

Worshipped winter? LMAO!!!!!!!! I'm betting they believed every word he said too.

This doesn't surprise me. The AFA is one of the groups that claims the Non-Christians are attacking Christmas. Come on... why would us Pagans attack something of our own??? =) Of course, they adamantly disagree that Christmas as has any Pagan origins/traditions in it at all.

I find it hilarious that people are this serious about whether or not a catalogue calls it a Family Tree or a Christmas Tree. Personally, my fave "decorations" are the Yule Log and the Mistletoe. ;-)

Edit:

John in AZ - some actual court documents on this Suppression would be nice. Because I just don't see it. You're on here complaining about it. And nowhere in Reigan's question does it say Christianity should be removed, so your little rant about how she isn't tolerant is baseless and rather childish. All this "Christians are being Suppressed in America" is quite a load and only people who have the persecution complex would say such a thing.

Answer 3

I'm a Christian and even though I'm annoyed with the fact that it's all about the Holidays and you hardly hear anything with the word Christmas (for example, "Happy Holidays" and "I'm so excited about the Holidays), when really Christmas "is the reason for the season", I don't care how much stuff about Christmas is in the store. Plenty of Christmasy stuff is out there in the stores before Halloween! If your a true Christian, you don't care about any of that stuff, just the reason of Christmas.

Answer 4

What is so horrible and offensive about the word "Christmas"?
I don't get it.

Some people LOOK for things to whine about.

I read this morning that Santa's "Ho Ho Ho" is offensive to prostitutes. They want it changed to "Ha Ha Ha."


I sincerely doubt that many Christians would even read that article.

Is the AFA fundamentalist?

How many people are in this group? What percentage of Christians belong to it? Of those, what is the percentage of Fundamentalists?

As for the Christmas trees, I seriously doubt that it will scar a child for life to see a decorated tree.

Answer 5

I am a Christian Preacher, writer and Evangelist and I could care less what the stores use as decorations or whether they call it Christmas or Holidays.
It has nothing to do with Jesus Christ, salvation or God.
It is strictly a money making day for a greedy world.

Answer 6

Hmmmm, how much money are they making off the holiday I wonder? Actually I find that each year the stores get tackier, if that could even be possible, with the whole Christmas thingy. Don't get me wrong I love the holiday, its cheerful, but there is a phrase that states, "going overboard."

Answer 7

Oh well, you can knock down all the Christmas stuff and we know it's all overdone, but it's all for the good of one thing...to keep up the economy of America. And if it wasen't for all this stuff we could be another 3rd world country where no one competes with each other and they sit around without hope wondering where their next meal will come from. God Bless America!

Answer 8

You need to watch the story of the grinch. Christmas starts in the heart not by material gifts. Without Christ in Christmas there be no celebration for many, just a time of unwrapping their wants and desires. There own lust.

Answer 9

The glint of Merchants' Christmas gets into my eyes.

I'm not really into the falseness of it all. We're keeping celebrations minimal at our house. Not even a tree this year. Peace has come because of that, not by buying and buying and feeling obligated to give because of the "Season".

Answer 10

Ah, yes. Christmas, allowing Christians to be proprietary about Pagan celebrations for 1500 years!