Conference taveng::bagels

First of all re:.2 - what does being "nominally" Jewish mean?

For those of us who are living in the Diaspora, Christmas will always be a
sensitive issue.  Although the U.S. is officially a secular country,
Dec. 25th brings home the fact that it is in reality a Christian country.
Why else would a religious holiday be a national holiday as well?

I think that the one month in which I'm continually in a bad mood is December.
There is absolutely no way in which one can escape from Christmas, inc., it
is all too-pervading.

My wife bought some cards for her gentile friends that just state happy 
holidays on them accompanied by a natural scene.  As far as cards go I don't
like receiving Chanuka cards, it irritates me.  To me it is all an effort
to create a "Jewish Christmas".

My in-laws, who came here from Germany, have a custom of exchanging gifts on
Chanuka.  I really thought it was strange (and still do), but I know that
they're not trying to imitate the goyim.  Yekkies just act that way, if you 
know what I mean.

David

One thing that has always bothered my inner most nerve endings
was someone who buys me a Chanukah card that has Hebrew all over
the front, and they say, what does the card say anyway....

It would mean much more to give a card that was hand written
and says Happy Hanukah or something like that.  After all, the card
might be a joke and say P*** off and die !  

It bothers me that non-jews expect you to know EVERYTHing about
X-mas when they know almost nothing about our religious holidays.
I know that I take the time to find out about religious holidays
if I am going to give a well wishing or card to the effect.

Michael

I, too, don't like Christmas.  Personally, I think a Mr. Scrooge had
a nice word for it, "Bah Humbug".  But a little history is interesting.
During the early days of the Mass. Bay Colony, celebrating Christmas
was prohibited by the Puritans!  They recognized it for what it was,
a weak excuse to christianize Saturnalia.  (Or some other reason to
dislike it.)  It only became important in the US during the 19th century,
helped along by the likes of Dickens, and by messrs. Filene, Jordan,
Bloomingdale, etc.

Many Jews, in fact, are major beneficiaries of the holiday.  Not the
least of them my own relatives in the retail business.  But even 
Christians have a hard time justifying it religiously, especially
given that scholars put JbJ's birth somewhere around October.

BTW, it's the best day of the year for Skiing!  No crowds at all at
the mountains that don't close.  Hmmm, time to make plans...

My family used to live in Brooklyn, in a mostly Jewish neighborhood free
from a lot of Christian influences.  We never sent Christmas or Chanukah
cards, and we kids got Chanukah presents (I was 11 when we left NY) for
whatever reason my parents had.  Not lots of presents, certainly not one a
day.  When we moved to New Jersey, to an overwhelmingly Christian area,
things didn't really change, although we were "bombarded" with Christmas in
the schools and felt pretty uncomfortable, esp having to say that we don't
celebrate Christmas and didn't get a million presents.  My parents even
stopped giving us Chanukah presents around this time, saying "we don't need
a holiday to buy you something if we want to".  This went hand-in-hand with
the fact that they didn't have much money to spend on things just for the
buying.  My sister and I never got into giving them "material" presents either.

When I joined my husband's non-jewish family I became wrapped up in Christmas
whether I liked it or not.  Sure, it's fun to gather around the living room
and exchange gifts, but I didn't enjoy deciding what to buy everyone, dealing
with the crowds at the stores, spending all that money, and wrapping everything
up.  All at the last minute, of course!  And I really can't say I miss it too
much now that we're getting divorced.  I guess I'm still of the school that
says "I'll buy you something if I want to, not because it's a holiday".  And
I see no reason to send a Christmas card to someone I can say "Merry
Christmas" to in person, or just send a card to someone far away when for a
little more effort I can send a letter or call if I care about them.

Jill

I got a good solution, instead of sending out Xmas cards why don't you just
send me a birthday mail since it's my Bday? Maybe I could get into the
Guinnes World Book of records for most Vax-cards... :-)
                          Greg

	    Seeing as how December marks the beginning of three months
	of winter, it's a good time to throw a party.  It's kind of nice
	that the northern hemisphere's major religions have holidays in
	December.  (Of course, the Christians had to fudge a bit on a
	certain somebody's birthday to do it.)
	    I try to keep my holiday greetings either nondenominational
	or multidenominational.  I think it's pretty obnoxious to have
	somebody else's holiday rammed down your throat.
	    One group I work with is having a December-Holiday-of-Your-
	Choice party.  The pagans insisted on it.
			<_Jym_>
	P.S.:  I agree that it's a nuisance not being able to send out
	for pizza on the 25th.

I usually find that it is VERY difficult to buy Chanukah cards
in the stores in places like Methuen mall.  I was appalled.

Michael