Said Without Irony

Time's Swampland gives us this statement from Senator Jim DeMint:

"You can't jam a major arms control treaty right before Christmas," DeMint tells Politico. "What's going on here is just wrong. This is the most sacred holiday for Christians.

We certainly wouldn't want any kind of arms reduction treaty that promotes world peace signed on the eve of Christmas. Not when we have worked so hard to pass far more pressing and appropriate-to-the-holiday legislation like extending tax cuts for the rich. It is priorities like these that tell you all you need to know about what the Senator knows about Jesus and why he thinks that Christmas is the most sacred holiday for Christians.

Songwriter Feinstein says Christmas isnt' just for Christians

Michael Feinstein explains in the NYTimes why Jews write Christmas songs:

The evolution of Christmas is reflected to a degree in its music. As the holiday has become more secular, so have its songs, with religious and spiritual compositions largely supplanted by the banalities of Rudolph, sleigh bells and Santa. Many Christians feel that the true essence of Christmas has been lost, and I respect that opinion. It must be difficult to see religious tradition eroded in the name of commerce and further dissipated by others’ embrace of a holiday without a sense of what it truly means to the faithful.

Yet I also hope that those who feel this encroachment will on some level understand that the spirit of the holiday is universal. We live in a multicultural time and the mixing, and mixing up, of traditions is an inevitable result. Hence we have the almost century-old custom of American Jews creating a lot more Christmas music than Hanukkah music.

If you look at a list of the most popular Christmas songs, you’ll find that the writers are disproportionately Jewish: Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas,” “The Christmas Song” (yes, Mel Tormé was Jewish), “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!,” “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” “Silver Bells,” “Santa Baby,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Winter Wonderland” — perennial, beloved and, mostly, written for the sheet music publishers of Tin Pan Alley, not for a show or film. (Two notable exceptions: “White Christmas,” introduced in “Holiday Inn,” and “Silver Bells,” written for “The Lemon Drop Kid.”)

...In my holiday shows, I’m always looking for novel expressions of the season, and when I introduce a new song I don’t usually think about the religion of its creator. That said, I’m always pleased to discover a surprising juxtaposition. It doesn’t take Freud to figure out that the sugarplums, holly and mistletoe all tap into a sense of comfort, longing, security and peace that so many fervently desire; that we all wish the clichés were true. As Jews, Christians, Muslims, Mormons, Buddhists and everything in between, we are all more alike than we are different. That’s something to celebrate.

Feinstein is right-on here. Jesus and what he stands for isn't just for Christians. The real problem, if there is one, isn't that Christmas is being stolen or commercialized or lost; it's that for the most part Christians don't pay any attention to it's meaning for the rest of the year.

Buy a Real Tree

I don't really understand the appeal of artificial trees. I guess it is just a matter of convenience. Or safety. We have a fake tree at church because fire code requires it. But there is nothing like the smell of a real tree. And, they are grown locally; artificial trees grow in China. Real trees are also more environmentally friendly:

Live trees actively photosynthesize as they grow from saplings, which removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. After they have been cut and Christmas is over, they're usually chipped for mulch. As mulch, the bits of tree very slowly decompose, releasing carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere. So in the end, a real Christmas tree is carbon neutral, putting the same amount of carbon dioxide back into the air as it took out (albeit much more slowly).

The tree farms that grew the trees also replant after the trees are cut.

Artificial trees, on the other hand, don't come out even in the carbon balance. Petroleum is used to make the plastics in the trees and lots of carbon dioxide-creating energy is required to make and transport them.

Because these trees just end up in landfills after a few years' use, "those greenhouse gases are lost forever," Springer said. "There's really no opportunity to recycle those."

Buy a real Christmas tree this year.