It is almost December 25, Christmas in this country, and as
much as I love this festive season, I have to put up with those who have deemed
themselves holy crusaders to keep Atheists and similar views out of this
holiday season.
Some time ago people here realized that Jews don’t celebrate
Christmas so some people began trying to include Chanukah in these holidays. In
some cities as in New York there are a lot of Jews. There are menorahs and many
people say “happy Chanukah.”
A few years ago I studied Druidry and after a couple of
years of hanging out with other pagans, I decided to go back to a more humanist
approach to spirituality and I adapted the doctrines of Epicurus. Epicurus did
not deny the existence of god(s) but decided that gods take care of gods and humans
need to take care of themselves. He also told people we should learn not to
blame everything on gods. ‘If your house is crushed by an earthquake it isn’t
the anger of the gods, you built your house in an earthquake prone place.’ And
he didn’t believe in an after-life.
But I still like the December and fall holidays, so I still
celebrate Halloween or Samhain and Christmas which I call Winter Solstice. The
solstice was actually the December holiday that was taken over by the early
Christians. Many of the old symbols are still used—such as putting a tree in
the house and decorating it.
I’m sure many athiests celebrate these holidays as well. So
why then do Christians get so angry if non-Christians want to celebrate the
holiday? Why the blatant hatred against all of us by conservative Christians?
For example, just recently I saw an article in the Huff Post where the president
of a Kentucky creationist museum told Fox News that Christmas was a “time to
take on the atheists” who used their free speech rights to doubt the existence
of God;
“Well, it wouldn’t be Christmas without someone complaining
about Christ,” Fox & Friends host
Elisabeth Hasselbeck told Creation Museum President Ken Ham, noting that
atheists had put
up a billboard in Time Square which suggested that Christ was
not needed during Christmas.
“You know, the atheist who are a very small minority in the
population have been trying to impose their religion of atheism on the culture
now for quite a while,” Ham explained. “You know, getting Bible, prayer out of
schools. Christian symbols out of public places.”
And the most infuriating statement from this person was;
“I mean, what’s the atheists’ message? There is no God? When
you die that’s the end of you? So everything’s just meaningless and
hopelessness?”
Why is it that if we don’t believe in god and a religion
that focuses on god being more important than anything else we are “meaningless
and hopeless?”
I am a Maoist first and an Epicurean second. Either way, I
believe that people come first, not gods and not the afterlife. Why then are
people like me accused of trying to put doubt about god in people?’ Don’t
these Christians have enough faith in their own beliefs that they can stand it
when some says “I don’t believe that?”
It is obvious that Ham does not really know what atheists believe,
because he has raised the question ‘what do they believe in?’ I notice he didn’t
bother to ask an atheist, he just assumed.
Here in Kansas the town of Salina wanted to revive the old Mayor's Christmas Party and rename it Winter Holiday Party to
be more inclusive. The town’s folks threw a hissy fit and the mayor changed the
name back to Christmas.
Again the idiot from Fox said;
“The atheists are only a small part of the population,” Hamm
said. “And really, it’s that minority, less than 2 percent of the population,
that seem to be having such say in our culture, in imposing their anti-God
religion.”
I’m not trying to promote anything—I’m trying to celebrate
some holidays. I’m part of the culture of this country whether this fool likes
it or not. He can’t erase non-Christians and atheist from this country.
If that is a problem for some
Christians they can fuck off!
And Have a happy Winter
Solstice!
-សតិវ អតុ
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