Holidays

Give the guy credit. I don't think I could think of any more effective way to desecrate Christmas, a holiday based on innocence and the love of simplicity that is the manger. > Blown-up images of [Paris] Hilton and strings of pink Christmas lights adorn the front lawn

Look at the bright side: Only the good can be defiled. These mutants prove the good of Santa Claus, I guess: > In 1994, the San Francisco chapter of the Cacophony Society staged the world's very first SantaCon. Influenced by the surrealist movement, Discordianism, and other subversive art

Great news for the good news season: According to the LA Times this morning [http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-christmas9dec09,0,4039464.story?coll=la-home-headlines] , Lowe's, Target, Walgreens, Macy's, and others have made efforts to bring the word "Christmas" back into their

Archbishop Chaput of Denver has written a great little essay about the difference between Christmas and Xmas [http://www.catholicexchange.com/vm/index.asp?vm_id=6&art_id=31083]. Excerpt: > The world has an ingenious ability to attach itself to what Christians believe; tame it, subvert it,

I side with the anti-ACLUites in the Christmas Wars, I really do, but they're going to lose if they insist on seeing every generic holiday greeting as a sign of secularism. The phrase "Happy Holidays" isn't always a capituation. In fact, I always thought

First Target, now these guys: > Willow Creek Community Church, one of the largest churches in the Chicago area, will be closed on Sunday, Dec. 25--because it's Christmas. > Although thousands of the faithful usually flock to the South Barrington church and its satellites on Sundays, Willow Creek

> A 162-year-old Christmas card - one of the first ever printed - sold at auction Saturday for $16,000. > The hand-colored card, which shows a family celebrating around a table, is one of about 10 surviving from an original batch of 1,000 printed in 1843, auctioneer Henry

What's next? The silver pole? > It worried Mitra Sen when pupils at her school were not allowed to take part in multicultural celebrations because their parents didn't want them to be exposed to different cultural and religious beliefs. > Afraid these kids would be deprived

> Austria's traditional Christmas devils have been given police clearance to carry on smacking people's back-sides. > Locals in towns across the country dress up as either St Nicholas, handing out sweets to the good, or as the devil, handing out beatings to the bad. >