IN HIS weekly column in this newspaper, businessman Aubyn Hill last Wednesday addressed the agenda of some in the United States to speak of 'Happy Holidays' in preference to 'Happy Christmas'.
Hill hints that this move is consistent with the secularist, atheistic and multiculturalist efforts intentionally to push God on the periphery of U.S. national life. It is this kind of philosophic approach that undergirds efforts to remove every mention of God in courthouses and schools. It even extends as far as seeking to rid the American currency of the words 'In God we trust'.
At around this time of year in the North America and elsewhere, Buddhists, Hindus, and Jews observe their respective holidays. But none of those religious groups come under noticeable attack for the observation of their sacred days. These groups sense no pressure to tone down the rhetoric of their religious festivals and holy days. How is it that in America where most of the population adhere to a Christian world view, it is all of a sudden inappropriate to talk about the birth of Christ, who is central to Christianity?
The founding fathers of the United States, amid their many moral shortcomings, decided that the nation would be built on Christian ideals. When Americans capitulate to political correctness and delete 'Christ' from Christmas and wish each other 'Happy Holidays' and 'Season's Greetings' they are, in effect, divorcing their Christian heritage and denying the biblical tradition on which their nation was founded.
Most Americans, while not necessarily practising Christians, nevertheless are sympathetic to biblical ideals. How then can wishing someone a 'Happy Christmas' be so offensive? It begs the question is speaking about 'happy holidays' an example of political correctness going awry? Is not the birth of Jesus Christ the reason for the season?
The political correctness 'circus' surrounding the Christmas in the U.S. ought not to be glossed over by Jamaicans for this nation, too, was founded on Christian ideals, as is evident in the words of the National Anthem and National Pledge. Admittedly, some local commercial interests have been wishing the public 'Happy Holidays' and 'Seasons in Greetings'. But one gets the feeling that this has more to do with being unwittingly influenced by the mores of North America than an intentional design to not speak of Jesus for fear of offending others in the spirit of political correctness.
It is on the Christian ethic that much of the western world's social institutions, such as marriage, family, education, medical care, hospitals, and good government rests. This nation, like America, needs to ask itself what kind of future it expects to have if it capitulates to political correctness and thereby weaken the spiritual and moral cement that sustains us as a coherent unit.
In the history of civilisation, no society has been known to haemorrhage by embracing the principles Jesus Christ embodied. We believe the excising of 'Christ' from Christmas would be a step that is likely to place Jamaica further down the road to socio-economic and moral impoverishment.
For us, taking 'Christ' out of Christmas would be, in the words of Ebenezer Scrooge, a humbug. And so, without reservation, we wish you all a Happy Christmas!
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
