Have you ever noticed how often the Christmas guerrillas trivialize Christmas even as they defend it? Here’s an example, by a Darlene Darleen Click [she won’t debate me, but she wants her name spelled correctly, so I’m obliging], who is upset because the University of North Carolina libraries will not be displaying Christmas trees this year. According to Eric Ferreri of the Charlotte Observer,

The trees, which have stood in the lobby areas of Wilson and Davis libraries each December, were kept in storage this year at the behest of Sarah Michalak, the associate provost for university libraries.

Michalak’s decision followed several years of queries and complaints from library employees and patrons bothered by the Christian display, Michalak said this week.

To which the above-linked Ms. Click wrote,

If these cranks aren’t loudly complaining in restaurants about being offended by the birthday cake on the next table, we can safely chalk this up to another lesson in Cultural Tolerance(tm) by Judea-Christophobic Leftists.

Ah, Ms. Click, how art thou stupid? Let me count the ways.

Let us first take up the knee-jerk assumption that people complaining about the Christmas trees must be “Leftists.” They might have been atheists (surely there are right-wing atheists), or Jews (could a Jew be a “Judea-Christophobic Leftist”?), or Seventh-Day Adventists. They might have been small-government conservatives complaining about their taxpayer dollars being spent on decorations.

That last part always confuses me. Small-government conservatives don’t want to spend taxpayer dollars on anything — well, except war. They don’t want to fund public education, maintain infrastructure, rebuild New Orleans, keep starving children from dropping dead on the streets, etc. But suggest not spending taxpayer dollars on religious displays (with which some taxpayers may disagree), and suddenly one is a “Judea-Christophobic Leftist.”

One can argue that Christmas is as much a secular and cultural holiday as a religious one, for which much of the trappings (notably anything to do with Santa Claus, flying reindeer, Christmas elves, etc., not to mention mistletoe and Yule logs, which are leftovers from Druidism) have nothing to do with the Christian religion, Claus’s mythic connections to Saint Nicholas of Myra notwithstanding. I think that’s a legitimate argument. But if you’re going to make that argument, you can’t very well complain that not observing that holiday is dissing Christianity.

But let’s get back to the trivialization part. Is Ms. Click comparing Christmas to a birthday party that might annoy other patrons in a restaurant? How is that comparison valid? Is she saying that Christmas is no big deal and if one doesn’t like it one should just ignore it? That’s fine, except to make the comparison parallel to the UNC library trees we’d have to have the annoyed patrons being forced to not only tolerate the party, but to pay for it. And then be told they won’t be allowed to have their own parties in the same space.

(I’m not going into the Establishment Clause today, although of course it applies; here’s an old post about it.)

Christmas is either a big deal, or it isn’t. Christians believe Christmas is the observance of the birth of Jesus, who, per the Council of Nicea, is “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father.” And that this birth was an essential step toward redeeming the sins of mankind, a teaching at the heart of Christianity.

So, one would assume that Christmas is profoundly sacred to Christians. And if Christmas is profoundly sacred, it should not be trivialized by being compared to birthday parties or, for that matter, used to sell merchandise in department stores. One would think.

Awhile back on the other blog I wrote a post about South Carolina selling Christian license plates. The plates feature a Christian cross, which is a sacred symbol for Christians. It struck me that a practicing Buddhist would not want a Buddhist license plate, because to place a sacred symbol of Buddhism in a place where it would be splashed with mud and slush and road grime would be unthinkable. (I’m sure people have put sacred Buddhist symbols on their bumpers, but a deeply devout Buddhist would not do that.)

This gets us to the issue of sacred symbols and how one takes care of them, and sacred days and how one observes them. IMO a large part of people who use tax money and government authority to push their religion on the rest of us don’t seem terribly interested in taking care of the sacred symbols as sacred symbols. Apparently it’s more important to shove crosses in everyone’s face — obviously, as a display of tribal dominance — than to show respect for the cross as a sacred symbol and keep it out of the mud.

Likewise, years ago, Christian ministers complained that Christmas was too commercial; that Christmas observance should be taken out of department stores and kept in church. Now we’re told that if store clerks say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” that this is an affront to Christianity. (What if the store clerk — or the customer — is Jewish, and being forced by commercial enterprise to pay lip service to a Christian holiday? What is that an affront to?)

All that is really important about the observance of Christmas is that Christians are free to observe it, and I pledge that I will stand up for them in defense of that freedom if it is ever threatened.

However, religious observance of Christmas does not require that the taxpayers of North Carolina pay for Christmas trees in the state university libraries.

This week those of us practicing many forms of Japanese Buddhism, particularly Zen, are observing Rohatsu. Rohatsu is something like Zen High Holy Days. It is an observance of the enlightenment of the historical Buddha more than 25 centuries ago, and right now in every Zen monastery in the world — well, except for some western ones that observe Rohatsu later in the month — monks and lay students are cloistered in silent retreats, meditating. On December 7 (last night of Rohatsu, which ends December 8 ) many will meditate through the entire night. It’s a way big deal. (I’m doing Rohatsu Lite — I’ve driven to the local Zen center to meditate for an hour and a half every day this week, and will be there all day tomorrow.)

We do this because it is important to us to do this. We’re not asking taxpayers to pay for it, nor do we expect anyone who is not a Buddhist to give a bleep.

Likewise, Christians are free to put up as many Christmas displays as they like — on their own or the church’s property, with their own money. It’s their religion, and it’s up to them, not taxpayers, to take care of it.

I’m not personally bothered by Christmas displays, including taxpayer-funded ones. I think wreaths and Christmas trees are pretty. Some of my Buddhist readers of the other blog say they observe Christmas, albeit in a non-Christian way. “After I took refuge, my Christmas tree became an enlightenment tree,” said one.

Still, apparently the trees bothered some people. Back to Eric Ferreri of the Charlotte Observer,

Michalak said that banishing the Christmas displays was not an easy decision but that she asked around to library colleagues at Duke, N.C. State and elsewhere and found no other one where Christmas trees were displayed.

Aside from the fact that a UNC Chapel Hill library is a public facility, Michalak said, libraries are places where information from all corners of the world and all belief systems is offered without judgment. Displaying one particular religion’s symbols is antithetical to that philosophy, she said.

“We strive in our collection to have a wide variety of ideas,” she said. “It doesn’t seem right to celebrate one particular set of customs.”

Or, you could display all of them. I believe today is the first day of Hajj, for example. I’m sure Ms. Click wouldn’t mind if the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill used taxpayer dollars to put up a Muslim display to go along with the Christmas trees.

My point is that if Christians would stop taking affront at non-Christians who don’t kowtow to Christmas, and instead just observe Christmas with all the solemnity and reverence it ought to require, the world would be a better place.

(BTW, as thick as Ms. Click is, she’s a genius compared to Don Surber. He seems to think that because the UNC is in a town named Chapel Hill, the library must be a chapel. Or something.)