This Christmas, Don't Let Them Turn Off the Lights

by Rabbi Aryeh Spero
Posted Nov 3, 2005

Somehow Christmas seemed darker last year, bereft of its usual radiance. Like a heroic soldier, it was left alone to fend off a platoon of barrages against it. Shots came from many quarters – all contesting the placement of Christmas symbols in public areas.

No protests came, however, from Orthodox Jews, nor those who, while not Orthodox, remain traditionally-valued. And that is because this group understands and appreciates the ameliorating influence that religion provides civic life, so long as the religion does not call for, as in the case of radical Islam, the oppression of "infidels."

What better use of public property than the portrayal of values -- such as peace and goodwill to all men -- redounding to society's benefit, as is done, for example, on billboards regarding the hazards of drunk driving?

Furthermore, this group realizes that it is not religion per se but America's brand of Protestant Christianity that has created such a hospitable environment for Jews, since it celebrates Judaism as a pillar and forerunner to its own Judeo-Christian ethic. Only in America does a form of Protestantism exist that sees in a living Judaism an actual affirmation of biblical Christianity. Evangelicals actually feel a personal bond to Judaism and the Jewish people -- as opposed to the historic theology that while tolerating it, assumed a separateness from it. This is a world "first" in the 2000 year relationship between Christianity and Judaism.

In contrast, many ardent secularists are discomfited by public displays of Christianity inasmuch as it makes them feel like "outsiders." They lack the rootedness and sense of security that serious daily observance, faith, or sheer regard for religion offers. The answer to such insecurity, however, lies not in an annual legal and political war against those, Christians, celebrating their religion, but in being fulfilled and secure in one's own religion.

But to practice ritually, believe or, at least, highly regard would mean they would no longer be secular. And being secular is precisely who they are, what they want to be, and constitutes, for them, their "enlightened" identity.

It is not the duty of Christians to forgo their religious _expression to accommodate those who seem unable to fill their own religious void. Nor should Americans be deprived of historic and cultural Seasonal joys because of the intolerance and stinginess of those apparently incapable of live and let live.

So as not to stand out nor be challenged by the religious traditions and values held by most Americans, the rabid secularists years ago embarked on a campaign to negate Christianity and other parts of Americana. In effect, neutralize the majority and its ethos by changing the culture to fit its secular lifestyle and perspective.

If the majority-held religion and attitudes can be leveled to where no one identifies with something unique, then there is no longer a majority ethos, instead a "classlessness." By working overtime and capitalizing on the politeness of those Americans who wish never to "offend," they have created a tyranny of the minority.

This neutralizing has been achieved through the concept of multiculturalism, which unlike diversity, wishes to reduce the distinctiveness of American culture. It cleverly labels Christmas displays and the Boy Scouts as "non-inclusive" and therefore, of all things, un-American.

Multiculturalism has been successful in not only neutering public Christianity and unique Americanism but, worse, convincing too many that their continuation is "chauvinistic" and "exclusive." While the secularists are capitalizing on the innate good-will of the American people, its victims – the American majority – have become unwitting partners in their own cultural self-destruction.

Multiculturalism is the American version and lingo for age-old Marxist/socialist "classlessness." It has taken hold because there exist in this country influential leaders of many different persuasions and races who subscribe to it. Those who have never understood the essence of America configure it through the prism of Europe and the Europeanism they crave. They are cultural elitists who disdain "cowboy" America and feel superior to it. Others are "cosmopolitans" who care not a wit nor identify with those in Peoria or Lansing but with Paris, Amsterdam, and Geneva.

Cultural nihilism has become the fashion of those infected with self-hate and those bored by Americanism, and by those in need to display their "worldliness" by minimizing the value of their own country's ways. But why should Americans still excited and inspired by our traditional ways and institutions be silenced and made to take a backseat, here in America, to those long-ago cynical and bored by it?

Be it multiculturalism or its broader socialist antecedent, its effects surely weaken a country. For a people without a distinct identity will be unwilling to fight those outside intent on conquering it , and will be afraid -- as we see daily -- to stand up to those within wishing to dissolve it. Why fight if what you are fighting for is no better than what your opponent wishes to impose? Absent something transcendent, what is the purpose of fighting or even maintaining? Even borders should be open to all and full citizen-like benefits provided illegals, the multiculturalists litigate, inasmuch as America has no special reason, nor right, to assign importance to its own identity and sovereign integrity. Liberalism has as its ultimate aim American culturecide.

Increasingly, their contentiousness goes beyond the church-state issue into areas touching all of American life -- be it lawsuits against the military, government interrogators of terrorists, border patrol, or the Boy Scouts. Most often these are members of the "Blame-America-First" chorus in matters having nothing to do with religion but foreign-policy issues. That tells us a lot about their general feeling about America and what they are really up to.

Generally, we find excuses and justifications for that and those we love while finding things to criticize in those and that which we dislike. Their never-ending, boisterous criticism of America vis a vis the rest of the world (even indicting the American people --- the most generous -- for not giving enough aid for the tsunami catastrophe) sheds light on their congenital anti-Americanism, which on the domestic side is manifest in their desire and actions to dismantle historic America and its way of life. At its core, it has little to do with the First Amendment.

To me, there is something emotionally wrong -- no matter the IQ – with spoilers who so denigrate and despise the very America that has given them so much and been the source of all their blessing and fame. Why would anyone take seriously and surrender to the machinations of such people, especially when it imperils that which they love?

For the politically motivated, removing Christmas from localities and villages all across the Red states is the way to avenge the 2004 election: "You think you control America…well you don't. Our A.C.L.U. lawyers will rule over your communities, and your Evangelical President is powerless to do anything about it."

They are equally oblivious to the pain of parents of Boy Scout troopers and the constant indictment of our soldiers inasmuch as they are, by and large, detached personally from these institutions and the individuals aligned with them. Even the removal of the Ten Commandments from public courthouses is non-personal given that to the secularist the Ten Commandments is not part of his glorious past but the core of the Evangelical present.

Most of us realize that among the most vocal entities spreading the message against Christianity, our traditional institutions, as well as the majority-held attitudes are the A.C.L.U., the New York Times, Hollywood, and the Anti-Defamation League. No one should be afraid to take these entities front-on out of fear of being labeled racist or callous to past historical injustices.

Fighting for the preservation of our historic American culture is not "offensive," nor "chauvinistic," nor "exclusionary." It's our heritage, one our children deserve.

Rabbi Spero is a radio talk show host, a pulpit rabbi, and president of Caucus for America. He can be reached at www.caucusforamerica.com.

Linked at Stop The ACLU