This time, it’s the made-up war on Thanksgiving. From the Christian Newswire:
Thanking your neighbor or Native Americans for teaching Pilgrims to fish and grow crops is not un-Christian. Redefining Thanksgiving as anything other than a call to give thanks to the one true and living God is an attempt to remove God from America’s one true Christian holiday.
Are some Christian groups just unhappy without a war on something at all times? Do they just sit around and make stuff up? Did they just de-frock Christmas as a “one true Christian holiday” and create their own war on Christmas?
I am unclear what you are driving at having asked so many questions. Christmas – the celebration of the birth of the Savior- is certainly a Christian holiday….unless you are an unbeliever who enjoys the season, the exchanging of gifts and some time off from work. Then it is not a Christian holiday to you. I as a Christian have no problem with that.
Thanksgiving appears to be a Christian holiday since it apparently originated from Christian pilgrims who gave thanks to the God of the Bible for arriving in the new world. If you are an unbeliever who celebrates Thanksgiving for other reasons I have no problem with that either.
If I say “Merry Christmas” to an unbeliever I do not know it should never be taken an insult. And I was just called for dinner.
Mike, it seems to me that called Thanksgiving the “one true Christian holiday” is pretty outrageous for Americans. It’s certainly become a “true” American holiday, not strictly a religious one (after all, it’s not mentioned in anyone’s Bible). I think it’s a little over-the-top to declare Thanksgiving the “one true” Christian holiday when that mantle is and should be worn by Christmas.
You can say “Merry Christmas” to me and I’ll say it right back to you. No one is insulted by good tidings; that’s why these “wars on …” are so silly.
Perhaps the difference is that as non-Christmas celebrators, we’re respectful (not just “tolerant”) of the holiday and those who celebrate it. It’d be nice if others felt that way toward those who celebrate non-Christian holidays by being informed about them and respecting them. I think that’s what the Founding Fathers had in mind, don’t you?
I would never claim Thanksgiving as the “one true Christian holiday.” I imagine you found some Christian web site that did. However, giving thanks is recurrent instruction in the Bible so we Christians are called to do it.
I believe the majority of the Founding Fathers were imperfect Christians who believed in the God of the Bible and His plan of salvation to those who repent and surrender to God’s written will. Some may have been for freedom to worship as one pleases and others may have been forceful to require all to worship the God of the Bible. That’s not scriptural.
Fortunately doing everything “right” is not a requirement for our Christian salvation. If it was nobody would get in, not even the apostles. Fortunately according to the scriptures gaining eternal life is dependent on who you know, not what you have accomplished or the mistakes you have made. They are forgiven which is why we give thanks and extend grace to others.
It’s not “some Christian website,” Mike. It’s a major Christian web site, the “Christian Newswire,” featured on Drudge and Sirirus Radio. That’s why this post was important – it’s not a fringe group starting a false ‘war’ on Thanksgiving; rather, it’s a well-funded well-heard group foisting that imperfect claim and that’s what gave me pause.
In this country where “one true G-d” is not a basis for our system of government and declaring G-d of any belief system to be could be the path to our nation’s downfall, I’m a little picky about who gets to define the “one true G-d” for everyone else.
Surely, there are more Christians in the US than any other single religion. But the wise Founding Dads knew enough that NO single religion gets to rule in our country. Stating that national holidays do not create a fictitious war on any religious group is very American. Can we agree on that?
I have been an evangelical Christian for 33 years now and a licensed minister of the Gospel for 25 years. I have never heard anyone in church claim Thanksgiving as the one true Christian holiday. So that’s a new one on me.
I would think that Easter would be the one true Christian holiday ….followed closely by Christmas. Most people I worship with believe in freedom of religion including the right to be an atheist. However, we do not believe there are many pathways to Heaven but only one way – Jesus Christ who said He was the only way. And in a free country we are free to believe that. And I respect a person’s right to reject that belief – or any belief.
And unlike many of my brothers and sisters I am for SILENT individual prayer in school to accomodate different beliefs or no belief at all.
How are we doin’ so far? :-)
Completely respect how you approach religion and really don’t care which holiday is the “one true” Christian holiday, although both Easter & Christmas are recognized by the Federal government, which gives them a certain status not attributed to other religions’ holy days. I don’t know how prayer in school got involved, but I’m all for young folks (and their teachers) praying whenever they want to – it doesn’t need to be a set time of day. After all, Jews and Muslims pray at specified times of day and they don’t coincide with school times. AFAIK, Christians can pray whenever they want and they should.
The issue of my post was that Thanksgiving hardly seems to me to a “one true” Christian holiday. It’s an American holiday. It transcends all religions (if you’re an American) and celebrates the country. I was irritated that a well-known and well-cited Christian group would try to claim it as “Christian” and imply that is was somehow separate and apart from American. It’s so woven into the fabric of American that no one should try to ‘claim’ it as their own except in the name of all Americans.
Although there’s a whole lot right with America, one of the problems she’s facing is the usurping of American things as belonging to special interest groups (including Christians, including Republicans, including libruls) that belong to everyone (like health care). Our American conversation has become a sordid shouting match where we can no longer disagree, but must hate the group with another opinion.
Co-opting Thanksgiving seemed to me to fit into that sorrowful trend.