Push to get retailers to drop 'holiday' language grows stronger, louder
By SAM HODGES and JEFFREY WEISS / The Dallas Morning News
Peace on earth? Not likely, with the Christmas cultural wars heating up.
Conservative talk show hosts have joined evangelical Christian groups in pressuring major retailers to use "Christmas" instead of the generic holiday language in advertising and store signs.
Meanwhile, the Rev. Jerry Falwell, a leader in the retail campaign, is criticizing some fellow evangelical pastors for deciding not to hold services on Christmas, which this year falls on a Sunday.
Even President Bush and first lady Laura Bush have been chided for sending out a seasonal greeting card that doesn't mention Jesus or Christmas.
How to handle Christmas is a hot topic – and not just with Christians. Rabbi Ralph Mecklenburger of Fort Worth's Beth-El Congregation recently preached on the subject.
He thinks it's silly that some stores and municipalities call a Christmas tree a "holiday tree."
"It's a Christmas tree. That's what it is," Rabbi Mecklenburger said in a phone interview. "We wouldn't want a menorah to be called a holiday menorah."
But he's opposed to efforts to force "Christmas" into advertising during the shopping season that begins around Thanksgiving, goes through New Year's and includes Hanukkah and Kwanzaa.
And he doesn't think the president and Mrs. Bush should be criticized for not mentioning Christmas in a seasonal card. "That's a kind of arrogance," he said. "It's a holiday season for lots of people, not just Christians."
Still, several high-profile individuals and groups are arguing that sensitivity has yielded to political correctness, with Christmas being the victim.
Along with Mr. Falwell, Fox News Channel talk show host Bill O'Reilly has taken up the cause. So have a handful of Christian legal and lobbying organizations, including the Catholic League, and the California-based "Committee to Save Merry Christmas."
John Gibson, also a Fox News Channel host, is the author of a new book called The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought.
Mr. Gibson writes about "public square" controversies – where government or public school officials discourage or prohibit specific Christmas observances.
But so far, the real heat has been on retailers, with Sears, Lowe's, Lands' End, Macy's and others facing questions about their advertising and store signs and whether their employees are free to say "Merry Christmas" to customers.
Target stores had been the subject of a boycott led by the American Family Association, a Mississippi-based group that said 700,000 people had signed on not to patronize the store. But Friday, the group called off the boycott, when Target officials released a statement saying they will become "more specific" in referring to both Christmas and Hanukkah in commercials and circulars.
On Thursday, AFA special projects director Randy Sharp said Fort Worth-based Radio Shack was among the companies changing their ways, adding "Christmas" to a third of its upcoming TV spots.
But Kay Jackson, a company spokeswoman, said the commercials were shot last summer "before this issue came on the radar screen."
"It concerns me if he's portraying that we did this under pressure," she said.
Lowe's, the hardware store company, acknowledged that until recently banners outside its stores said "Holiday Trees," though signs inside the store described the trees on sale as "Christmas trees." After complaints, the banners were removed, said Jennifer Smith, company spokeswoman.
She said the banners were not "political correctness gone awry" but an employee's mistaken effort to conform to the company's overall "Home for the Holidays" marketing theme.
"We adopted that several years ago. That's more cost-effective than to do individual campaigns for each of the holidays," she said.
Another argument about Christmas pits some of the nation's biggest congregations – megachurches, they're called – against Mr. Falwell.
Some of those big churches – including at least two in the Dallas area – will have no service this year on Christmas Day. Mr. Falwell, pastor of the large Thomas Road Baptist Church in Virginia, was on KRLD radio in Dallas on Friday suggesting that the decision offers ammunition to those who want to secularize the holiday.
Lake Pointe Church, an evangelical megachurch based in Rockwall, has three services scheduled for Christmas Eve, a Saturday, but none on that Sunday.
Lake Pointe's pastor, the Rev. Steve Stroope, said: "I respectfully disagree with Jerry Falwell. ... We're going to have 16,000 people who come joyously together to celebrate Christ's birth on Christmas Eve."
He's encouraging his congregation to spend Christmas Day with family and friends. "Long before the church was established, God established the family," he said.
On years when Christmas does not fall on Sunday, his church has no Christmas Day service. Those who object to not having a Christmas service this year are focusing on "legalisms," he said.
"I'm kind of blindsided that anybody would make a big deal of it."
Fellowship Church, based in Grapevine and with three remote campuses, is planning 20 Christmas-themed services for 40,000 people – but none on Christmas Day. The services will start the Wednesday before Christmas and go through Christmas Eve.
"We're going to leave Christmas Day as the time for the family," said church communications pastor Troy Page.
Many area churches that hold multiple Sunday services are scaling back to one for Christmas Sunday. But Robin Lovin, who teaches ethics at Southern Methodist University's Perkins School of Theology, agrees with Mr. Falwell that the church doors should be open.
"Not everybody has a family with whom they can spend that day," he said. "Some of those who do would value the opportunity to get out of the house and away from the turkey and tree and really have a place where they can reflect on the meaning of the day."
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WHAT IS POLITICALLY CORRECT?
How do politicians handle the potentially tricky business of sending greeting cards this time of year?
President Bush and first lady Laura Bush have sent cards that offer a generic holiday greeting and don't mention Christmas. This year, that has brought criticism from some conservatives who usually are supportive of the president.
"I threw out my White House card as soon as I got it," Joseph Farah, editor of the conservative Web site WorldNetDaily.com, told the The Washington Post.
But the Bush cards, paid for by the Republican National Committee, do include a verse from the Old Testament book of Psalms.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry and his family also sent a card that doesn't mention Christmas. It says, "This holiday season, may freedom ring, may peace conquer, may love endure." The Perry card also quotes from the Old Testament book of Nehemiah: "The joy of the Lord is your strength."
A spokeswoman for the governor, Kathy Walt, said the cards are paid for by his re-election campaign and go to friends, supporters and even some reporters. She noted that he has a Christmas wreath on his office door and a Christmas tree in a nearby public reception room.
"Governor Perry certainly applauds those who are shining a bright light on the war against Christmas that's being waged by liberals and others whose insistence on political correctness is nothing more than an effort to erase any reference to Christianity in public discourse," she said.
Mr. Perry, like the president, is a Christian who has had close ties with evangelical Christian groups.
Dallas Mayor Laura Miller joins her family in sending a card that offers general wishes for a happy holiday season, said spokesman Frank Librio. Ms. Miller, who is Jewish, does not send out an official card as mayor, he added.
Merry Christmas or else...
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