The right’s war against the spirit of Christmas
The rights war against the spirit of Christmas
By Harold Meyerson Opinion writer December 23 at 7:14 PM
They were refugees, fleeing for their lives from one Middle Eastern country to the next. As Matthew tells the tale, Joseph, fearing that the government had marked his newborn son for death, gathered up his wife and child and stole away by night across the Judean border into Egypt. And just in time: Unsure who, exactly, to kill, that government a king named Herod, whod heard some kid would one day become a rival king proceeded to slaughter every remaining child in Bethlehem under the age of 2.
This isnt a chapter of the Christmas story that has made it into the general celebration, but its there in the gospel, for those who give the gospels credence and for those who dont. For both groups, its clear that the authors of the New Testament intended to recount (for the believers) or compose (for the nons) a story that echoed the Old Testaments concern for strangers, foreigners and refugees (The stranger among you shall be as one born among you, says Leviticus, and you shall love him as yourself), that foreshadowed Jesus teachings to care for castaways and the least among us, and that laid the foundation for institutional Christianitys transnationalism.
Which is, perhaps, a long way of asking the question: Whos really waging a war against Christmas in 2015? Secular multiculturalists who, stealthily and nefariously, have somehow rendered Starbuckss coffee cups a tad less festive? Or the self-proclaimed culture warriors on behalf of traditional values, who demand we leave refugees even small children, as New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) has made pitilessly clear at the mercy of the latter-day Herods? Who condemn entire religions? Who fear and loathe strangers?
Its been a banner year for fear and loathing, xenophobia and racism. What has made the year genuinely ominous is the emergence of fictions presented (often, but hardly exclusively, by Donald Trump) as facts that legitimize a sense of both grievance and hatred: New Jersey Muslims celebrating 9/11; the quarter-million Syrians that the Obama administration is planning to bring in; a wave of black-on-white homicide. Concoctions all, but credible enough to the sizable share of Republicans who also believe the president is a Kenyan Muslim. Fed by talk radio, Fox News and paranoid websites, millions of our compatriots dwell in a parallel universe of alternative realities. My colleague Dana Milbank has noted that the fashion among conservatives is to dismiss hard facts that clash with their alternative realities as politically correct. Thats Republicanese for empirically correct verifiable by research, but at odds with the stories theyve created to justify their rage.
More:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-rights-war-against-the-spirit-of-christmas/2015/12/23/2a80b80c-a978-11e5-9b92-dea7cd4b1a4d_story.html?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-c%3Ahomepage%2Fstory