North Florida Nesties
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Re: Unpopular Opinions, Rants, Complaints, etc
Ashlee, you're one of my favorites but I'm not feeling what your throwing down here at all. I know this is UO and you're entitled to yours and I also know you don't mean it towards anyone personally, but I'm (admittedly my own fault) kind of taking it that way since I've been open about being an atheist and freaking loving Christmas.
The argument that religious holidays are only for Christians (or any religion) is like the argument against gay marriage. I don't get it. You still get Easter/Christmas/whatever. Who cares what other people do on that particular day?
You said you hate it for material reasons:
But earlier you said you hate when people use it "as an excuse" to eat and see family:
Say whaaaaaa? This is where I got confused. So since I'm not a Christian, I shouldn't go visit my family who all happen to be gathering in the same household for the one time that year? The one time that I also have off of work? I should just stay home since I'm not a Christian?
I also take issue with this:
Ruhlly? I know a lot of my family is religious, but they certainly don't sit around at the holidays holding a candlelight mass at Great Aunt Nancy's house. And not to call you out, but you asked CD how she handles Seagrams. My family drinks, your family drinks and that's cool! It's the holidays! We give each other gifts to show how much we love and appreciate each other. We certainly don't have to, but it's fun. No deeper meaning except that it's fun! No one owns Christmas or any other holiday.
I think our society has turned "religious" holidays into a way more commercialized deal. When/if we have kids, we'll do all of the "secular" holiday stuff and just won't go to church or delve into the religious portion. WTF does the Easter bunny have to do with Jesus rising from the dead? Santa Claus? Christmas lights? Christmas tree (which actually started as a pagan ritual)?
No one should be banned from Christmas as a winter holiday to spend time with and appreciate family because they don't believe baby Jesus was born the night before.
And while I'm on the subject... Christmas originated as a pagan holiday to celebrate the winter solstice. (Sorry for the crappy source! I have to go make dinner, but there's tons of info on the origin of Christmas on the google.)
"the google"
*snort*
LB, I promise I took more away from your thoughtful post than that...
I won't quote your whole post, Kate, b/c I hate super long quotes.
Like I said, I know it's an UO. I knew it would bring about discussion.
I just go by how my family is, Christmas morning we sing happy birthday to Jesus, we go to church, we light candles and sing hymns, etc. Christmas and Easter are very religious experiences for me. That's not how it is for everyone, I realize. But I NEVER get caught up in the family drama on Christmas or what to give someone because I know what it's all about. And it makes me sad that under the pretense of Christ's birth, society goes nuts with commercialism. I'm 100% not pointing fingers at anyone who celebrates whatever for any reason. I'm pretty apathetic in that sense, I have a very to each his own mindset, I just hate seeing others suffer in the literal sense or just headaches from family drama. I think if people were more focused on the whole "reason for the season" there wouldn't always be so much holiday stress and feelings of have/have not, high suicide rates, etc. I realize it won't ever happen though, because as you said, Christmas is a pagan holiday now, and Santa is what people think of, not baby Jesus. At this point, I really don't have anything else to add, I'm not always good at putting my thoughts down because they're ever evolving as I learn others' perspective.
Hopefully no one thinks I judge them for spending time with their family on holidays, no matter what your religion having days off from work and getting together always gets a thumbs up in my book.
Oh, and our drinking club takes place at weddings, graduations, and other non-religious celebrations. Of course we drink at holidays, but it's never a vice, it's in celebration. Just don't want you to think we're taking shots for Jesus
I'll take note - don't discuss religion with friends! Especially when you're a Lutheran Pastor's Daughter and your friend is an Atheist! While I enjoy learning your perspective, my personal religious convictions don't waver, just as I suspect I won't be getting you to come to church with me!
If you were, then maybe I'd consider coming out of my agnostic state.
Dittoing that point. I'm pretty sure we cover the range of religiousness (oh hiii I don't think you're a word..) here, and we've had much more intense conversations without coming to blows about it.
And FWIW, LB, I'm pretty sure the secular parts of easter are spring solstice related just like some of the christmas ones are winter solstice related. No time to look it up, but it has to be... I mean, eggs can't scream fertility more if they tried.. bunnies and chicks, etc. It's all the same "oh btw you're christian now, but we'll make our holidays the same time and do some of your stuff too so it's not toooooooooo awkward" deal.
Yeah, the bunny and egg parts of easter originated as a fertility rite to Ashtoreth, a Babylonian goddess--bunnies were sacrificed and eggs dipped in their blood to color them. Constantine attached Easter to the feast of Ashtoreth in his efforts to Christianize his empire and standardize the date of celebration. Apparently there was a lot of argument in the early church on when to celebrate it, so he settled the matter after 3 centuries of back and forth, but by then the two celebrations had kind of melded together anyway. So, technically, in order to strictly observe Easter as a religious holiday, you should completely abstain from using any other symbols, since they are extremely pagan.
And while I agree that family drama gets in the way of the meaning of the season, it's sometimes out of your control.
What's the verse?
Wherever two or more are gathered in my name, there I am sure *** will go down.