Merry Christmas!?!
"How offensive!"
Really?
OK, I was about to write something the day before yesterday - as another thing I woke up on - but I wasn't in the mood (you might know the drill) - and now I'm seeing this
Video - and apparently, yea, its a thing! [spooky voice-over] "Getting offended about saying 'Merry Christmas'".
MERRY FUCKING CHRISTMAS!!!
[shinies and sparkles]
("yeeeaaaaah!")
Now, I don't exactly remember what I was having on mind that morning - it was ... actually a whole bunch of stuff I was sure then already I couldn't keep on mind as to take
it to paper; And yet it all seemed kindof important. But eerilie enough, ... ..., well nah, but anyhow - I was also certain that I wouldn't come back to the same things
though it would seem that it'd be logical, evident and self-concluding - that, whatever else but the general core idea was about. Well, except for one thing - that at the end
of the line that Core idea would kindof relate to Christmas.
So - Christmas. As we nowadays kindof don't live in an all that Christian world and common Christian practices being not that strongly featured on this site either - I would
suggest that it makes sense to start this like, well, "lets take out our Bibles" - and open ("how offensive!"): Acts of the Apostles 11, Verses 4 to 17.
Now - I'm not gonna "read it out loud" here - so go and take your time and read it. If you want to read it in some wider context you should begin with Chapter 10. Now, this is
one of the few passages that I would come to open up and talk about when arguing with Seventh Day Adventists about their belief. (Though, in their defense - I guess its easy to
call them hypocrites - but - I mean, yea - thats what it is actually - but, this one isn't coming from me; It has happened as I went on a journey based on my belief - being a
Mormon but looking for an alternative because of my Testimony. I first went to Munich, then to Bonn and somehow ended up in Hannover, which happened to be a Sunday and so I
decided to go to a Mormon Church. As always - I was welcomed, ... we got to talk ... and as they however head how I got there they ended up a bit concerned. One of the higher
ranking Members offered me a stay in his house as to take care of my ride home. Which ... was how that story ended ... its kindof awkward ... but anyhow. (In L.A. the members
were much more ... 'forgiving' ... anyhow) - and while we were sitting in the car riding to the Train Station he told me, well, as I was not trying to hide my true agenda, ...
what he was thinking about what I was doing. He did put it that way: "If I were to come to your home and re-arrange all your stuff, you wouldn't be happy about it either!" -
something along those lines. And I didn't know how to respond to that. I was thinking something like, well "if thats what he makes of it, I might as well shut up!". As for what
it was like in LA - I was worried about something similar to happen. But they didn't care. I was invited to eat with them, visit the Temple, ... so, you'll meet different sorts
of people wherever you go. And somehow - despite all the many mistakes you may end up making, no matter from which direction you wanna look at it yourself, well, God wouldn't
be God - kindof - if God couldn't anticipate those and work with them, to say, somehow, mysteriously, things end up working out just fine. But if you're ignorant about it, about
what God wants, you won't even get there where you would do those kinds of mistakes! You'll end up sitting in your house, however you chose to decorate it, but ... I won't judge
whether or not thats where you should be to begin with! I can't! Thats not my duty/responsibility! At the end of the day, whatever drove me to Hannover, ... well, we could say
that it was naivity, as in hindsight I gained some insights during that journey that aren't all that noteworthy, and for the most part I even forgot that I've ever been down
that road. In essence what I've seen was ... total, abstract normality. In Munich I kindof ended up ringing a random bell - as, to basically have a place to stay at. At that time
there was only a girl. She had an open mind, but it got weird as her cousin rang the bell, or was it her little brother? I don't know. Obviously there was something sexual going
on that the boy was too young to be aware of hiding. In Bonn I visited a Mormon Sect, ... and they seemed oddly ... deaf ... to what I was saying. At the end of the day I think
it all comes down to 'preparation' - and in the big and broad, well, its ever been so that only a few have been "chosen" to hear the word - and in that sense ... I find my passivity
is rooted. I've also had harsher arguments at times - and that doesn't really solve anything either!)
Or well, rather than me arguing about their belief we might say that its me arguing about mine - as, I don't really know how to be politically correct when it comes to these kinds
of things. Truth is Truth! But, this isn't about the Seventh Day Adventists - nor about their belief - this is about Christmas.
Now, what we have in those verses is a Story about Peter - and while on the one side the prominent feature is about clean and unclean food - its on the other end a story about
Jews and Gentiles. It draws a very odd picture of what Jewish Christians believed - not what we might expect from an Enlightened society. Yet, Anthropologically it makes a whole
lot of sense. The Jews ... or rather so: The Jewish Religion is a very ... how we wanna say ... 'strict' or 'governmental' belief, whereas the Romans or Greek - their Religion
was rather idealistic. We can further deepen that by comparing the Roman/Greek idolatry to the Hindu idolatry. The Hindu have a much larger focus on the spiritualistic aspects of
their Gods - whereas the Romans or Greek Gods are more like Symbols for various foundations of a society - as we might want to say: Intellectuall more advanced, or, more independent
from Systems of Belief - and so more oriented towards the practical side of things. But - I guess its fairer to assume that these things don't ultimately matter. You have people
like this and people like that everywhere. Rather than drawing a Nationalistic line - I guess its fairer to assume that amongst all the early believers there were only a few that
were truely ready for the more advanced stuff. And as for Paul - well - the Doctrine & Covenants re-assure me that he wasn't all that legitimate of a Christian. Which is a thing
about the Bible/New Testament itself - how it came together, as in what it was, should have been and has become.
Nowadays it seems to have somewhat become common sense that Jesus didn't actually get born at Christmas! As it is also known that Christmas - as we celebrate it today - has originally
been some "Heathen" holliday. Now, have you ever wondered how that came together? The general idea would be that some Germans or whatever converted to Christendom and somehow chose
to Celebrate Christs birthday during Winter Solstice - but - actually - we don't really know. Looking for Historical references seems to indicate that the success of Christmas as
celebrated on Winter Solstice is more due to the fact that Winter Solstice has already been a widely established Holliday.
It is really aggrovating to go and try taking Christian History somehow seriously; Because chances are that all information you'll find is so confusing that you cannot make an
accurate assumption or conclusion no matter how plain and obvious it practically begs you to just speak it out loud. Which is some irony! I mean, whatever argument you wanna pick,
there is always a counter argument unless you make no argument at all! And why is that so?
That doesn't seem like 'the Religion of Truth'! Quite the opposite! But ... "the Light, it shines in the Darkness and Darkness comprehended it not!" (John 1:5).
Thats not an argument! But - we know about arguments, right? So I come to the 'non argument' that: "Those who have eyes to see will see, and those who have ears to hear will
hear!". So, at any rate, we're celebrating Christmas on the 25th these days, though, if we wanted to be retro we might also pick the 25th of May.
We can go further and wonder what kidns of psychological effects it has that we celebrate Christs death during Spring (which is actually rather accurate) and 'the Feast of Love'
during winter. To me it always felt right, to have Christmas during Winter, as it being a cold and depressing time. But rather than the time it would seem to be our society that
is harsh, cold and depressing, much like winter, and Christmas - is like a lonely candle flickering in a dark snowy landscape. A symbol of hope? The past few years however I have
come to truely appreciate eastern time/pentecost as my favourite holliday season. We have a lot of hollidays to begin with, and the warm weather is really inviting me to - chillax;
While working during that time does at least to me always feel a bit strange. As though its not supposed to be. As though I were stuck in a bad movie or something; An alternate
Dimension of some kind maybe. And isn't that time anyway much more complementary to Love? And as it being past eastern; We first get to celebrate his death during the end of winter,
and right away entering summertime - seems much more ... cheerful! Nowadays we got this whole eastern thing followed by a huge chunk of work sprinkled with a few hollidays to end
up celebrating Love in winter. Just to make it through the coldest time to end up celebrating Christs death again. It seems like a farce!
On top of it all - I reckon its a rather common theme that people don't really care about "the spirit of Christmas" all that much. Although - in complementary to our contemporary
society I still believe that Christmas is rightly settled in Winter. There is that Spirit of Christmas ... to help those that suffer; Which would be the most urgent during the
shittiest time of the year anyway ... but there is the other Spirit of Christmas - that of meeting with family members and being all happy and cheerful and living in perfect
harmony and all that (nonsense). I'm not in the mood for that, during the shittiest time of the year. I wanna get past it - and do I have to feel like a bad person for it?
I mean of course are all the presents nice - yet there is also Nicolaus Day - which works for me, you know, as - Presents and Christmas don't really fit! I mean - I 'expect' to
get presents at Christmas - which I'm aware of is odd cause I so far never could really effort anything to give away myself - but, here I just wanna emphasize what I think most
people feel alike! That its kindof odd to link some demand of thanksgiving to that. Its anyway more so the opposite of Spirituality! Like, freezing keeps me from "meditating" -
I'm rather glad that I'm in some place warm than thankful for the beloved ones around me. And stuff like that.
So - I wanna think about: What if we just thought it up - that we have Christmas in may; And in Winter just and only Winter Solstice. As a Christian Unity. What does it mean?
We could see that yea - its about to get summer again! (yea!). Hot Wine! (yea!). Commerce! Yea, thats the opposite to spirituality - but its what we do in this world! "At the
Climax of Darkness"! If we move Spirituality to summer, the Darkness is practically gone! Because then ... you would figure ... we don't have "spiritual Darkness" - but - a
Fire in the Cold Night ... we might say.
And so I must contemplate. What I was writing earlier - I was about to get it all wrong! Which - I mean - reminds me of those days, where I went to Hannover for instance. I was
naive - and a lot of what I believed in hasn't really been 'ripe' yet. I would jump at those conclusions that stuck out to me as basically begging me for getting pronounced -
but - I guess - as much as I can't say that I would have been right, I can't say that it would have been wrong either!
See - a lot of the 'coldness' I get these days is perpetuated or at least carried/supplemented by ... "this" "harsh seriousness" - which science can't really do a lot about
because it just is inherantly serious stuff! So as a scientist or science-believer/advocate you got to be serious - and I wouldn't (want to) expect anything else. And the
alternative to that would be ... what? As a Christian you're getting "constantly "rekt"" on the internet - and while you try to be serious as a Christian all this Christmas/Commerce
Cult these days makes it hard to just light a candle for peace! Being a Christian is like being a Candle in a Blizzard. Then there are Trolls. I mean, LOL! That its even a thing
to say that! Yea - "Trolls Exist!" (trollolol). And while everyone keeps getting more and more serious - we have to become even more serious to separate truth from nonsense -
and in the end we're all utterly unhappy except for those that wanted this outcome! Who we can imagine sit in their Penthouses high above us all sipping their whatever they drink
and would end up being the only ones that Celebrate "Christmas" the "right way".
And by my current understanding it isn't even "Un-christmas-sy" to say that! Maybe it is - but then we ain't got Christmas these days! We got winter-solstice/Commerce-mas - and
we might wanna use that to poke fun at what we don't like - trolling all together - for the time being - or more generally - to contemplate about our society and the things we
do right and wrong; While at the end of the day, calling it a day.
As I so go/went on - you possibly got a faint idea of why I wanted you to read that Bible Passage in the beginning. It means, what it means. It means to me that we as Christians may
have our own rituals and beliefs and what not - but instead of bragging with them and demanding others to follow suit, we may also do what we there would expect from others; And to
join them in their festivities - and maybe learn a few things in process. That way we can become friends - and maybe talk about the Gospel. I don't know whether thats how Christmas
came to be Christmas as we know it today or not - but meanwhile I tend towards saying that if, there's probably more to it than just that! But anyway - I hope you enjoyed reading
this ... and if not ... I at least hope that it did you some good!
Happy Winter Solstice!
by: Christopher Nikolaus Sonnberger | 2016.12.23 - 12:10