Making Room for Christ at Christmas

Dur­ing the Christ­mas sea­son, we as Chris­tians hope to focus on the com­ing of Christ.   We can do this indi­vid­u­ally by prepar­ing a place for Jesus Christ in our hearts, and we can do this within our com­mu­ni­ties by shar­ing the gift of Christ’s love with oth­ers in our lives.

At the same time, as Chris­tians we need to be aware that dur­ing the Christ­mas sea­son, and through­out the year, there are also groups that are attempt­ing to remove ref­er­ences to Christ from our pub­lic cul­ture: from our schools, from our town squares and from the cel­e­bra­tions car­ried on around the Christ­mas hol­i­day.   Let’s look at these efforts to remove Christ from the pub­lic cel­e­bra­tion of Christ­mas and dis­cuss how we should respond-​​-​​with a spirit of char­ity, and with the goal of being effective.

His­tory of Reli­gion and Government

To under­stand the cur­rent debates on the pub­lic role of Christ in Christ­mas it is impor­tant to look briefly at the his­tory of the rela­tion­ship between reli­gion and gov­ern­ment in our nation.   The framers of our Con­sti­tu­tion wanted to both pro­tect the free­dom of indi­vid­u­als to prac­tice the reli­gion of their choice, and to pro­hibit the gov­ern­ment from estab­lish­ing a state reli­gion.   The 1st Amend­ment to the Con­sti­tu­tion states, “Con­gress shall make no law respect­ing an estab­lish­ment of reli­gion, or pro­hibit­ing the free exer­cise thereof”.

Since our nation’s found­ing, var­i­ous groups and the courts have debated the mean­ing of gov­ern­ment not estab­lish­ing a reli­gion, while also main­tain­ing the free exer­cise of reli­gion.   Our courts have come to an agree­ment that the “Estab­lish­ment Clause” isn’t vio­lated when gov­ern­ment pays for sick patients to receive care in reli­gious hos­pi­tals, and pays for stu­dents to receive an edu­ca­tion in reli­gious schools.   The courts’ rul­ings often focus on whether indi­vid­u­als are forced through gov­ern­ment action to par­tic­i­pate in a reli­gious endeavor, rea­son­ing that if indi­vid­u­als are not forced or com­pelled, then the Estab­lish­ment Clause is not violated.

Christ­mas and   the Estab­lish­ment Clause

Some believe the Estab­lish­ment Clause is vio­lated when Christ is men­tioned or depicted in Christ­mas cel­e­bra­tions within pub­lic schools and on pub­lic prop­erty.   Over the years, groups have chal­lenged the actions of cities and states in pre­sent­ing Nativ­ity scenes on pub­lic prop­erty, and hav­ing Christ­mas car­ols sung within pub­lic schools.   Since the 1980s, var­i­ous Supreme Court rul­ings have in gen­eral out­lined that reli­gious sym­bols and songs within pub­lic schools and on gov­ern­ment prop­erty do not vio­late the Estab­lish­ment Clause if they are pre­sented as part of our cul­tural her­itage, where the reli­gious dis­play or ref­er­ence is one of sev­eral reli­gious choices and /​ or non-​​religious ref­er­ences, reflect­ing the diver­sity of our nation (see ref­er­ences for Supreme Court rul­ing in the Resources section).

A Nativ­ity scene by itself, though, in a town square would likely be ruled by the courts as vio­lat­ing the Estab­lish­ment Clause for pro­mot­ing one reli­gious belief and pro­mot­ing reli­gion in gen­eral.   How­ever, exhibits con­tain­ing a Nativ­ity scene along with other faith com­mu­ni­ties’ sym­bols and non-​​religious hol­i­day sym­bols have been ruled as accept­able and not vio­lat­ing the Estab­lish­ment Clause.

Look­ing at a recent exam­ple in a school set­ting in Salt Lake City, Utah stu­dents at West High School began to pre­pare for their annual Christ­mas con­cert tour. The group sang both non-​​religious and reli­gious songs. One stu­dent named Rachel then decided that it was unfair to her that she be forced to sing songs that cel­e­brated the birth of Christ. So she decided to sue the teacher who led the choir, the school, and the state of Utah. Rachel and the orga­ni­za­tions that sup­ported her, argued that since she didn’t believe in Christ­mas, singing songs about it restricted her reli­gious freedom.

An advo­cacy group and legal foun­da­tion, The Becket Fund , came to assist the teacher and the school in defend­ing the right of the teacher and stu­dents to sing Christ­mas songs in their con­cert. The Becket Fund wanted to defend the prin­ci­ple “that reli­gion is a valid part of our cul­ture and our her­itage, and that the Con­sti­tu­tion does not require us to pre­tend that it isn’t.” The Becket Fund agreed with the major­ity of par­ents that it was a case of defend­ing pub­lic school stu­dents from anti-​​religious cen­sor­ship. It argued that such cen­sor­ship was against true free­dom of reli­gion .

The Becket Fund and West High School also argued that Rachel was not forced to join the choir. Reli­gious free­dom meant that the stu­dents, who chose to sing, should be able to sing Christ­mas songs at Christ­mas­time. Fur­ther­more, the Becket Fund argued, there were a mix­ture of Chris­t­ian Christ­mas songs and other sec­u­lar, hol­i­day melodies included in the con­cert. The 10th Cir­cuit Court ruled that the school was allowed to have a Christ­mas con­cert and include Christ­mas songs that men­tioned Christ.   The court pointed out that Rachel “had a choice whether or not to sing songs she believedinfringed upon her exer­cise of reli­gious free­dom.” In this way, the free expres­sion of reli­gion of the other stu­dents and the teacher at West High school was protected.

Ris­ing to the Chal­lenge of Secularism

It’s impor­tant for us as Chris­tians to respect the rights of oth­ers to fol­low dif­fer­ent faiths than ours, or not fol­low any reli­gion at all.   But, it is also impor­tant that we defend our own rights to prac­tice our faith and to not allow some groups to elim­i­nate reli­gion and Chris­tian­ity from our pub­lic life.   This endeavor to remove reli­gion from our pub­lic life is a form of sec­u­lar­ism.   As we have seen, a cer­tain amount of sep­a­ra­tion between the gov­ern­ment and reli­gion is right, such as the gov­ern­ment not estab­lish­ing one reli­gion as our country’s “offi­cial reli­gion”.   How­ever, intol­er­antsec­u­lar­ism , which seeks to elim­i­nate any ref­er­ences, cel­e­bra­tion or acknowl­edge­ment of reli­gion in pub­lic life car­ries great risks.

Our nation’s found­ing fathers often spoke and wrote about how reli­gion, which did not impose itself on oth­ers, was a great advan­tage for our new nation in help­ing our cit­i­zens to develop the virtues nec­es­sary for democ­racy to suc­ceed.   Virtues such as respect for oth­ers, tol­er­ance for oth­ers’ views, will­ing­ness to sac­ri­fice for a larger good, char­ity toward oth­ers, are all effec­tively taught through the Chris­t­ian faith and other reli­gions.   If we were to elim­i­nate reli­gion from pub­lic life, then we would send to our chil­dren and cit­i­zens the incor­rect mes­sage that reli­gion is more of a per­sonal mat­ter that has lit­tle impact on the pub­lic good.   Over time, this cul­tural demean­ing of the value of reli­gion would harm us as indi­vid­u­als and harm our nation.

Cur­rent Challenges

This Christ­mas sea­son new chal­lenges have arisen.   Ini­tially, the Christ­mas tree in front of the U.S. Con­gress was renamed a “hol­i­day tree”.   For­tu­nately, the Speaker of the House, Denny Hastert, led a suc­cess­ful effort to change the name back to the Christ­mas tree.   This type of sec­u­lar­ism that tries to pub­licly rename a faith community’s sym­bols shows a lack of respect for the cul­ture and tra­di­tion of others.

In some com­mu­ni­ties and schools, offi­cials are afraid of a legal chal­lenge if they present any­thing reli­gious in school activ­i­ties, or present reli­gious sym­bols on pub­lic prop­erty.   In these instances, we need to effec­tively state the truth that reli­gion is a part of our her­itage that should be cel­e­brated, and to remind our com­mu­ni­ties of the great ben­e­fits that reli­gion offers to us as indi­vid­u­als and to our nation.

Joy­fully Live the Rea­son for the Season

In addi­tion to rais­ing oth­ers’ aware­ness of tak­ing Christ out of Christ­mas, we can also look within our­selves to deepen our own obser­vance of Christ­mas.   Sim­ple things like mak­ing a point of earnestly wish­ing oth­ers a “Merry Christ­mas” instead of “happy hol­i­days” can go a long way in mov­ing us as indi­vid­u­als, and our cul­ture at large back to Christ.   Focus­ing on the reli­gious Christ­mas tra­di­tions such as prayers by the Nativ­ity set or Advent wreath at home, instead of shop­ping for exam­ple, will also help us cen­ter our hearts and minds back on Christ. Finally, ramp­ing up our acts of char­ity can help us to grow in love and gen­eros­ity dur­ing Advent and the Christ­mas season.

The forces of sec­u­lar­ism will likely always be with us tempt­ing us to take God and reli­gion out of our pub­lic life.   Our chal­lenge is to main­tain our vig­i­lance, iden­tify when these chal­lenges arise, and be effec­tive in coun­ter­ing them.   Some­times we need to mobi­lize our tal­ents and resources in defend­ing our rights in the courts.   More often, we need to make our views known within our local com­mu­ni­ties and schools that it is impor­tant to keep God and reli­gion in our pub­lic life, for our own good and the good of our nation.   And always, we need to strive to more com­pletely and coura­geously live out the love of Christ, which will bring the most hearts and minds to Him and keep the focus on Christ in this Christ­mas sea­son and through­out the year.

Bible Blurbs

“She wrapped him in swad­dling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.“
(Luke 2:6-7)

So do not be ashamed of your tes­ti­mony to our Lord, nor of me, a pris­oner for his sake; but bear your share of hard­ship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God.“
(2 Tim­o­thy 1:6-7)

“So they called them back and ordered them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. Peter and John, how­ever, said to them in reply, “Whether it is right in the sight of God for us to obey you rather than God, you be the judges. It is impos­si­ble for us not to speak about what we have seen and heard.“
(Acts 4: 18-​​20)

Pope Quotes

“A just laicism allows reli­gious free­dom. The state does not impose reli­gion but rather gives space to reli­gions … and there­fore it allows these reli­gions to be fac­tors in build­ing up soci­ety.“
(Car­di­nal Joseph Ratzinger (Now Pope Bene­dict XVI) inter­view with La Rep­pub­lica 19 Novem­ber 2004)
”…despite being steeped in a rich Chris­t­ian her­itage, (these coun­tries) today face the per­va­sive advance of sec­u­lar­ism. .… This loss of a sense of God … leaves many men and women… feel­ing dis­ori­ented and at times even with­out hope.“
(Pope John Paul II, Address to the bish­ops of Eng­land and Wales, Octo­ber 23, 2003)
“In con­tem­po­rary soci­ety, which shows such vis­i­ble signs of sec­u­lar­ism, we must not give in to despair or a lack of enthu­si­asm in pas­toral projects. Remem­ber that the Holy Spirit gives you the strength you need.“
(Pope Bene­dict XVI, Address to bish­ops of Mex­ico, Sep­tem­ber 23, 2003)
“Peo­ple often invoke the prin­ci­ple of sec­u­lar­ity, legit­i­mate in itself if it is under­stood as the dis­tinc­tion between the polit­i­cal com­mu­nity and reli­gions (cf. Gaudium et Spes, n. 76). But dis­tinc­tion does not mean igno­rance! Sec­u­lar­ity is not sec­u­lar­ism! It is noth­ing other than respect for all beliefs on the part of the State that assures the free exer­cise of rit­ual, spir­i­tual, cul­tural and char­i­ta­ble activ­i­ties by com­mu­ni­ties of believ­ers. In a plu­ral­is­tic soci­ety, sec­u­lar­ity is a place for com­mu­ni­ca­tion between the dif­fer­ent spir­i­tual tra­di­tions and the nation.“
(Pope John Paul II Jan 12, 2004)
“In our times, sec­u­lar­ism advances, threat­en­ing to lead soci­eties of for­mer evan­ge­liza­tion to forms of agnos­ti­cism that con­sti­tute a real chal­lenge for believers…In this con­text, the tes­ti­mony of those who, out of fidelity to Christ and to the Gospel, have not hes­i­tated to give their lives, acquires extra­or­di­nary elo­quence… With their exam­ple, they encour­age Chris­tians to a coura­geous con­sis­tency” to the point of “hero­ism.
(Pope John Pual II Decem­ber 11, 2004, Mes­sage sent to Bishop Sal­va­tore Boccaccio)

Saints and Heroes

Defender of the Reli­gious Free­dom

ST. THOMAS BECKET
Thomas was born in 1118 in Nor­mandy, France, which then was a part of Eng­land. Thomas grew up in a very well-​​to-​​do fam­ily and was edu­cated at the finest insti­tu­tions in Paris and Lon­don.
As an adult Thomas was given one of the high­est posts in British gov­ern­ment, that of Chan­cel­lor. He served King Henry II in a way that pleased the king, and was his close friend. When the Arch­bishop of Can­ter­bury died, King Henry had Thomas appointed as Arch­bishop. King Henry hoped he could influ­ence the Catholic Church in a greater way through Thomas.
His new respon­si­bil­ity brought a dra­matic con­ver­sion of soul and atti­tude to Thomas. As soon as he became Arch­bishop, Thomas abruptly changed his rela­tion­ship with Henry, show­ing his alle­giance to the Church and the Pope instead of to his friend, the king of Eng­land.
Thomas sought to sep­a­rate the Church in Eng­land from gov­ern­men­tal con­trol. After many dis­agree­ments with the king, Thomas fled Eng­land to live in France while con­tin­u­ing to shep­herd his flock in Eng­land.
Thomas even­tu­ally came to an agree­ment with Henry II, and returned to Eng­land.
But just few days after his return, some knights, who were friends of King Henry, bru­tally mur­dered Thomas on the steps of the Cathe­dral in Can­ter­bury. It was clear that he died because of his defense of the Church against con­trol from Henry II. St. Thomas is remem­bered as a great defender of reli­gious freedom.

Maker of First Live Nativ­ity Scene

ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI
One of the Church’s most beloved saints, St. Fran­cis was born into a wealthy fam­ily in Italy. He led a rau­cous life of par­ty­ing, fought in two wars and was set to take over his father’s mer­chant busi­ness. But, shock­ing his par­ents and friends, Fran­cis left all this to lead a life of prayer, penance and poverty. Fran­cis began to attract fol­low­ers who joined him in his life and they are now known as the Fran­cis­cans.
Francis’s spir­i­tu­al­ity of poverty and love for the poor stirred a great devo­tion to the birth of Christ. A few years before his death, St. Fran­cis is cred­ited with putting on the first live nativ­ity scene and enrich­ing our under­stand­ing of the mys­tery and beauty of Christ’s com­ing to earth in the poor­est of envi­ron­ments. Sev­eral mir­a­cles hap­pened in rela­tion to this nativ­ity scene (See instructor’s resources.)

Story of St. Fran­cis and the Nativ­ity Scene

One of Fran­cis’ fol­low­ers, St Bene­dict, describes the Nativ­ity scene that Fran­cis orga­nized and the mir­a­cle that occurred in the small town of Gre­cio in Italy:
It hap­pened in the third year before his death, that in order to excite the inhab­i­tants of Gre­cio to com­mem­o­rate the nativ­ity of the Infant Jesus with great devo­tion, [St. Fran­cis] pre­pared a manger, and brought hay, and an ox and an ass to the place appointed. The brethren were sum­moned, the peo­ple ran together, the for­est resounded with their voices, and that ven­er­a­ble night was made glo­ri­ous by many and bril­liant lights and sonorous psalms of praise. The man of God [St. Fran­cis] stood before the manger, full of devo­tion and piety, bathed in tears and radi­ant with joy. Then he preached to the peo­ple around the nativ­ity of the poor King; and being unable to utter His name for the ten­der­ness of His love, He called Him the Babe of Beth­le­hem.
A cer­tain valiant and vera­cious sol­dier, Mas­ter John of Gre­cio, who, for the love of Christ, had left the war­fare of this world, and become a dear friend of this holy man, affirmed that he beheld an Infant mar­velously beau­ti­ful, sleep­ing in the manger, Whom the blessed Father Fran­cis embraced with both his arms, as if he would awake Him from sleep. This vision of the devout sol­dier is cred­i­ble, not only by rea­son of the sanc­tity of him that saw it, but by rea­son of the mir­a­cles which after­wards con­firmed its truth. For exam­ple of Fran­cis, if it be con­sid­ered by the world, is doubt­less suf­fi­cient to excite all hearts which are neg­li­gent in the faith of Christ; and the hay of that manger, being pre­served by the peo­ple, mirac­u­lously cured all dis­eases of cat­tle, and many other pesti­lences; God thus in all things glo­ri­fy­ing his ser­vant, and wit­ness­ing to the great effi­cacy of his holy prayers by man­i­fest prodi­gies and mir­a­cles.
St. Bonaven­ture (d. 1274)

Vocab­u­lary:

Advo­cacy group: Orga­ni­za­tion that pro­motes or defends cer­tain val­ues
Courage: Brav­ery to do the right thing
Defend: Pro­tect with courage
Duty: Oblig­a­tion, respon­si­bil­ity
Faith: Com­mit­ment to God, trust in him
Fear: Cow­ardice, lack of brav­ery
Free­dom of reli­gion: Right of peo­ple to prac­tice their own faith and express it in pub­lic
Hero­ism: Brav­ery in action
Intol­er­ant sec­u­lar­ism: Aggres­sive effort to expel reli­gious expres­sion from pub­lic
Respect: Fully acknowl­edg­ing the dig­nity and value of every per­son
Respon­si­bil­ity: To accept and meet our duties in life
Sec­u­lar: Belong­ing to this world and this time
The Becket Fund: “A bi-​​partisan and ecu­meni­cal public-​​interest law firm that pro­tects the free expres­sion of all reli­gious tra­di­tions” (from their website)

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

1. What are some other hol­i­days that have reli­gious roots?
2. What are some of the short­falls of a sys­tem of pub­lic expres­sion which refuse to allow religion?
3. What is the dif­fer­ence between the free expres­sion of reli­gion and sep­a­ra­tion of church and state? At what point should we draw the line between state-​​supported and state-​​allowed reli­gion? Is it nec­es­sar­ily wrong to pro­mote your own reli­gion (pros­e­ly­tize)? How would the sec­u­lar­ist argue against proselytism?
4. What is the dif­fer­ence between cul­ture and reli­gion? How are these things related?
5. Bene­dict XVI spoke out against sec­u­lar­ism. Does soci­ety really need reli­gion? What hap­pens when we com­pletely remove faith and reli­gion from society?
6. Although we can­not pro­mote Chris­tian­ity through our gov­ern­ment, reli­gion is rec­og­nized as legit­i­mate by our gov­ern­ment, and cer­tain Judeo-​​Christian val­ues have inspired many prin­ci­ples in our gov­ern­ment, such as the respect for the dig­nity of every per­son. Are these val­ues help­ful to our soci­ety? Do they hurt our gov­ern­ment or help it? How do they do this? What would hap­pen if they were not there?
7. Why are some groups lob­by­ing for elim­i­na­tion of reli­gious expres­sion in pub­lic insti­tu­tions and pub­lic cul­ture? How can this affect our society?
8. Is putting a manger scene in a town square pro­mot­ing Chris­tian­ity or cel­e­brat­ing Christ­mas? Is there a dif­fer­ence? Who loses out when this sym­bol is removed from our pub­lic view?

WEB LINKS:

Review of Supreme Court rul­ings con­cern­ing reli­gious dis­plays on gov­ern­ment prop­erty: 1984 Lynch v. Don­nelly, 1989 Allegheny County v. Greater Pitts­burgh ACLU
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