Reflections From a Murky Pond

To paraphrase Frank Herbert’s character Gurney Halleck, mood is a thing for cattle and loveplay, not defining a national character or what is right and wrong. In point of fact, if one is an a relationship, I’m not even sure if mood is always a thing for loveplay either.

And yet, as Ravi Zacharias pointed out in Jesus Among Other Gods, there is a certain mood promulgated by the Liberal and Progressives within America that seeks to do exactly that.

Not all moods were created equal and some are, or should be, less tolerable than others.

The difficulty has not been in knowing what to say, but in knowing what not to say. We are living in a time when sensitivities are at the surface, often vented with cutting words. Philosophically, you can believe anything, so long as you don’t claim it to be true. Morally you can practice anything so long as you do not claim it is a better way, Religiously you can hold to anything, so long as you do not bring Jesus Christ into it. If an idea is eastern it is granted critical immunity; if it is western it is thoroughly criticized. Thus a journalist can walk into a church and mock its carryings on, but he or she dare not do the same if the ceremony is from the eastern fold. Such is the mood at the end of the twentieth century.

A mood can be a dangerous sate of mind, because it can crush reason under the weight of feeling. But that is precisely what I feel postmodernism represents – a mood

Zacharias definitely has the right of it. The Liberals and Progressives are very much not in the mood to hear or hear about Christian religious speech, except within carefully circumscribe locales. Conversely, they’re quite in the mood to both hear and defend almost any form of Eastern religious speech in almost any venue, especially Islamic speech.

It is to the point where these domestic enemies will cry in outrage over a Christian saying homosexuality is a sin yet remain silent upon or even support a Muslim who says that the Qur’an and the Hadith state that homosexuals should be killed.

So far, me and mine are outside of this issue. We’re Pagans and, while Western, the Liberals and Progressives by and large don’t yet think of Paganism as a religion so we can express any religious view we want whenever and wherever we want without repercussion…as long as it doesn’t agree with the Judeo-Christian norm.

It sort of make me pity the Christians. America was and still is a Christian nation, culturally if not legalistically, and they’re the normative majority. Yet they, and only they, are the ones attacked for any display of their faith or attempted exercise of morality.

Christmastide in America is supposed to be about warmth, caring, and family, yet that’s wasn’t in any way, shape, or form the tone, nuance, or feeling of the Obamas’ “Holiday” card.

A Cold Season’s Greeting From The Obamas

It’s more than a little ironic that the card references, “the warmth and joy of the holidays” when its design and message is so cold, empty, and aloof. In fact it’s so ironic that, if I didn’t know better, I’d say that the Obama’s were courting the Hipster vote.

It’s colors are cool, not warm, which seems to refute the warmth that Christmas brings to people in the dark of winter. It shows a vacant building, which seems symbolic when one considers that Obama invariable answer to all the scandals revealed in the past year is to disclaim knowledge or responsibility. And lastly, despite going out at Christmas time and despite Obama’s claims to be a Christian, the card makes no mention of Christmas.

Still, this is what one has to expect from the Obamas. They are neither Americans nor Christians so whatever card they approved wasn’t ever going to glorify either the American idea of Christmas or the Christian one. Even the overall tone of the card should have been expected as it perfectly summates the elitist, aloof, above-it-all attitude that Obama has displayed since being installed into office.

My fellow Americans, Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas as well to all of you foreign nationals who celebrate the holiday and who visit here.

Christmas – A Very American Holiday

Yes, I’m what is easiest to describe as Pagan, but I celebrate Christmas. My religious holy day was Yule. Christmas, to me, a secular, American holiday – a part of the intrinsic culture and character of America, but having only a tangential relationship with Advent and the celebration of the mortal birth of Jesus.

This is what the Godless and their Liberal and Progressive enablers and fellow travelers don’t seem to understand. Their war on Christmas – and all public expressions of Christianity or Christian beliefs and morals – is also a war on American culture, on Americana if you will. It’s a base attack on part of what it means to be American.

This is also what the Christians don’t seem to understand. Christmas, as it is celebrated in America, hasn’t been centered upon Christ in living memory. It’s a cultural holiday largely made of up of traditions and iconography that were created or, at least, promulgated by Coca Cola, Macy’s, and Norman Rockwell.

So once again, I wish a Merry Christmas to all of my fellow Americans. As for you Liberals and Progressives, may Krampus take you and your get. 😉

For my Christian readers, especially those who are Catholic or Anglican, here’s something old school to celebrate the coming of Christmas with.

Domine, ad adiuvandum me festina. Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto. Sicut erat in principio, et nunc et semper, et in saecula saeculorum. Amen. Alleluia.

It is after the last week of Advent.

Veni Veni, Emmanuel

It is a metrical version of the Antiphon, O Emmanuel and dates back to at least the 12th century.

O Emmanuel, Rex et legifer noster, exspectatio gentium, et Salvator earum: veni ad salvandum nos Domine Deus noster.

That particular antiphon would be sung, chanted, or recited at Vespers on December 23rd and is the final in the series of “O Antiphons.”

So enjoy a bit of the past and its grace and majesty, my friends and other readers. Worry yourselves not one bit over the Pagan who’s so familiar with traditions that you’ve long ago cast aside. 😉

Merry Christmas!

Today is my religious winter Holy Day, Yule. Wednesday the 25th will be my American winter holiday, Christmas.

Michael Whelan’s “Winter Queen” and “Summer Queen”

So I wish one and all a blessed Yule and will enjoy the day with my family while the Goddesses decide the year’s fate.