by Tasha Raymond

Created on: November 10, 2009   Last Updated: November 12, 2009

Let us start by having a little bit of clarification: by celebrating a holiday publicly, that does not mean going out and making a fool of yourself by celebrating it as a holiday to be greedy and redeem presents from those that use it as an excuse not to be loving to you the rest of the year. Publicly celebrating a holiday means that you announce your faith to the world with open arms; that you are willing to acknowledge the importance of the day in your faith; that you willingly participate in the activities that you find show the meaning of you holiday and faith.

Now let me say the second most important piece here: I'm Pagan. There have been numerous of my religion that have pointed fingers, saying that if we have to fight for our own religious rights and be denied, than Christians should be denied as well. While we may not have a biblical scripture that tells us to "do unto others as thou wants done," we do have the Three Fold Law and such that states the same thing. If we want the right to practice publicly and openly celebrate our holidays, we need to be willing to support others to do the same.

Christians should under no terms or circumstance be discouraged from celebrating Christmas publicly. To very literal of the day, it is the holiday that marks the birth of their religion and life style. Without Jesus' birth, Christianity would not exist. To tell a Christian that they are not allowed to publicly celebrate their holiday would be the same as telling them to not publicly announce, support, nor act their religion. I hate to pull the Constitution card here, but I will: we in America have freedom of religion. If we say that one can not publicly practice, are we upholding that freedom? The answer there is simple. For those in other countries, no gain was ever made by hiding your beliefs from others, especially those that may stand alongside of you.

Understand that there are those Christians, as in any religion, that will abuse a holiday as a time for lustful gains, whether that be in the flesh, foods, or material possessions. Should this cause such an issue that those who celebrate the day wholly and holy should not be able to do so? I would hope that the masses would answer with "no" on that. "The sins of the many" should not foul everything up for those that are truly spiritual.

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