Janet Wilder > wrote:
: On 12/23/2013 8:28 PM, W. Baker wrote:
: > Todd > wrote:
: > : On 12/23/2013 11:23 AM, KROM wrote:
: > : > I wasn?t calling for Jews to celebrate with Christians..I was inviting
: > : > friends to eat..period.
: >
: > : That is what I was getting at too. What did you think I meant?
: > : Ambush them with holy water? I was only talking about the
: > : secular portion. You are celebrating, have lots of food,
: > : your friends of another faith are not, invite them in. Pig
: > : out together. Watch the Packers lose (again). No proselytizing
: > : involved -- just friendship. Would you really want your friends
: > : to be alone on Christmas?
: > You are celebrating something that has caused a great deal of pain to Jews
: > over the millenia. We really don't want to share your holiday, bt, at
: > this time, some 70 or so years after the hend of the Holocaust, we are
: > happy you are enjoying your holiday, with all its religious and secular
: > aspects, but do let us enjoy our own and we can have nice and happy meals
: > together on totally secular dys and on occasions like the US thanksgiving
: > which really is clelebrated as E Pluribus Unem with a central turkey adn
: > side dishes form many of the cultures that have become part of the US over
: > the centuries.
: >
: > New Years eve and Day are also time we can celebrate together or even just
: > a Monday night in january when it is dark early and cold, so good
: > companionship adn shared food and drink woudl be welcome.
: >
: > Wendy
: >

: My thoughts on Christmas

: We have had dinner with Christian friends on Christmas, but it's not a
: holiday we celebrate in our home. When we are with our friends we are
: really celebrating being with them and not their holiday. Most of them
: aren't celebrating in any religious manner anyway. We send them
: Christmas cards and we wish people a Merry Christmas, because we
: recognize their holiday.

: I find very little religion in Christmas as its celebrated in the US.
: It seems to be getting more and more commercially oriented every year.
: I do like the music (the best selling Christmas song was written by an
: immigrant Jew) and I fondly recall the spirit of peace on earth and
: goodwill to mankind that seems to have gotten lost in the scramble for
: bargains on Black Friday at the stores.

: When I was a teenager living near NYC, we used to go to St. Patrick's
: Cathedral on Christmas Eve and stand outside during midnight mass where
: speakers broadcast the beautiful music. None of us were Catholic or even
: Christian for that matter, but we appreciated the "concert" for it's
: musical value.

: When Wendy and I celebrate holidays, there is *always* an element of
: religious practice involved. Even Chanukah, which has taken on a lot
: more importance than it really has, is celebrated by lighting candles
: every night and saying special blessings, in Hebrew, as we light them.
: The kids, who are expecting gifts, know that they come after, the
: candles are lit and the religious portion of the holiday is observed.

: Christianity, historically, has not been kind to the rest of the world
: and anyone who forgets the forced conversions, murder and evil treatment
: of those who did not adhere to the Church is denying history just as
: many Muslims deny the Holocaust. Wendy's feelings are very understandable.


: --
: Janet Wilder
: Way-the-heck-south Texas
: Spelling doesn't count. Cooking does.
Thanks, Janet. I sit here listening to WKCR(columbis University's radio
station) playing the music of JS Bach everyday fro last Saturday through
New years. I listen to the istrument and the volca music and absolutely
adore it! Musch of the vocal is christian, but I am not listening to the
wrods as such, but the glorious music that , whether secular or religious,
lifts my spirit and soul and makes me thin of my wonderful husband, who
played musch of this music and loved it as I do.

One doesn't cut off onself formt eh rest of the country by not observign
Christmas, even in its secular forms of intense shopping ocnpetitiona,
coking and drinkin orgies, etc. I prefer to leave it to others who have
some connectin to te original meaning of the holiday.

Wendy