More misc. humbug

The kids wanted to watch the Muppet Christmas Carol last night, so we did. I think I called it tedious in my previous blog. That's complimentary. I about gagged on it.

Over the weekend, we had some family friends over for lunch. It's always a good time. I was bothered, though, by a story John told to my wife.

John said his company was having a party this month and the sign announcing it proclaimed a "holiday party." One of the workers, a Baptist minister, crossed out the word "holiday" and wrote in "Christmas."

That deeply bothers me.

The company was trying to be inclusive, especially because there are many Vietnamese employees who are not necessarily Christian. The minister was trying to be exclusive, saying the party was only for Christians.

Herein lies one of my longstanding problems with Christians and why I chose a different path to spiritual discovery. I've long thought the Christian creed should not be "Love your neighbor," but "It's my way or the highway."

Christians say you have to -- have to -- find your salvation through Jesus. Period. There are some ministers who have said this is not true, that enlightenment can come through many other paths. These ministers who dared show tolerance in this part of the country have been driven out of there pulpits and their churches have been confiscated by their denominations.

I strongly believe in the better part of Christmas -- love, peace, tolerance, charity, humbleness, sincere self-awareness -- but I detest the forced nature of other parts -- mandatory gift giving (what if I tagged you as a Scrooge for not giving gifts during Diwali?) and worship of something that is not mine (what if I made you say, "All glories to Sri Krishna," at the end of your shift at work?).

Bringing it home

An incident at my work really highlights this problem.

The dayside folks had a holiday putluck soup event to raise money for the United Way. A list was tacked up with all our names to assign us things to bring. Nothing like public humiliation to get you to give to a good cause!

More importantly, the event happened at a time that was difficult for me and other night folks to attend (imagine if we held this at 11:30 p.m. Wednesday, the time we night folks might like some soup!).

Now, I must say, a night-shift event was planned, but was cancelled. I'm not sure why. I think because half the newsroom night crew was off the day the event was planned, leaving like four people instead of the dayside 20 to do the event, or that the mailroom crew (those who insert those ads into your paper) works an even more distruptive schedule than the newsroom.

Anyway, a dayside employee wanders over to me and with a holier-than-thou grin on her face and says, "Oh, I see the night crew isn't having a potluck. Must be a problem with participation. He-he-he."

She could have asked if we few folks on the night crew wanted a snack from the party (that's called charity), or she could have volunteered to help us try something else to make us feel part of the larger group (that's called compassion). No, she was just being Christian.

Oh, one last thing. That night of the potluck, another dayside employee called me after midnight, after I'd been working for about 10.5 hours, and asked me to go down to the basement and get her pie plate she brought for the potluck. She didn't want any of the night people to steal it!

Thought: I know some people who need a visit from the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future.