I thought mods were supposed to be impartial.

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Originally Posted by markw

OK, that's one.

...big whoop. :rolleyes:

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That was from a 2 second search and if I cared more, I'm sure I could find many more but it does not matter, you were wrong and also expecting something that has effected people for 200 years to automatically turn around in one year is a bit unrealistic.

By the way, you and T have been the only cry baby whiners around here lately. You first by starting the deleted post just trying to stir up trouble and this post crying about the same people who have not banned your old sorry @ss already.

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Originally Posted by StevenSurprenant

I agree. The only thing I would change is to block any posts that contain name calling, especially when it gets really stupid and vindictive. Other than that, two thumbs up!

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My thanks to you and Hyfi for the appreciation.

I agree with your comment above. Unfortunately, this site only has three mods for the entire forum and we all have our own lives. Personally, I work full-time and go to college part-time. I haven't had a lot of free time to spend here reading everything that goes on. But after the Romney thread, I am trying to keep a closer eye on things and, believe me, if this thread starts heading in that same direction we will be deleting comments and entire posts if we need to.

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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn

But I also wonder about my original question...how is this not going against the First Amendment? Or is it just that since nobody has ever challenged the laws in these States they remain on the books.

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I had a bit of time tonight to review the link that Noddinoff provided, and found my answer...

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Originally Posted by Wiki

In the United States, six state constitutions officially include religious tests that would effectively prevent atheists from holding public office, and in some cases being a juror/witness, though these have not generally been enforced since the early nineteenth century.[40][41][42] The U.S. Constitution allows for an affirmation instead of an oath in order to accommodate atheists and others in court or seeking to hold public office.[40][43] In 1961, the United States Supreme Court explicitly overturned the Maryland provision in the Torcaso v. Watkins decision, holding that laws requiring "a belief in the existence of God" in order to hold public office violated freedom of religion provided for by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.[40][44][45] This decision is generally understood to also apply to witness oaths.[46]

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Originally Posted by markw

Can you find any athiests that hold any office in any state at all? I can't. And I'm not just looking in those seven states.

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You're not looking very hard then. Several are named in the article that noddinoff posted.

I'll post the link again so that you don't need to scroll back to find it and read it. Just scroll down to where it says United States. Discrimination against atheists - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And before you suggest it, I'm not whining that Atheists are being descriminated against (as the article title implies) I'm just responding to your inquiry regarding whether I can find an atheist in any office in any state at all. My answer is "yes, I can".

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Originally Posted by Hyfi

Maybe some people might find it interesting to learn how to do a google search or maybe it's just a reading-comprehension issue.

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:ciappa:

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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn

You're not looking very hard then. Several are named in the article that noddinoff posted.

I'll post the link again so that you don't need to scroll back to find it and read it. Just scroll down to where it says United States. Discrimination against atheists - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And before you suggest it, I'm not whining that Atheists are being descriminated against (as the article title implies) I'm just responding to your inquiry regarding whether I can find an atheist in any office in any state at all. My answer is "yes, I can".

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Then they have nothing to complain about. If it doesn't bother the Americians, why should it bother a few powerless canadians so?

As for Hifi, it's nice to see him having such fun playing with himself.

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Originally Posted by markw

Then they have nothing to complain about. If it doesn't bother the Americians, why should it bother a few powerless canadians so?

As for Hifi, it's nice to see him having such fun playing with himself.

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Mark, I am sensing anger and bitterness from you. Everyone else is being civil but you. Your being able to rant and offend is proof we are impartial.

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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn

I had a bit of time tonight to review the link that Noddinoff provided, and found my answer...

Originally Posted by Wiki
In the United States, six state constitutions officially include religious tests that would effectively prevent atheists from holding public office, and in some cases being a juror/witness, though these have not generally been enforced since the early nineteenth century.[40][41][42] The U.S. Constitution allows for an affirmation instead of an oath in order to accommodate atheists and others in court or seeking to hold public office.[40][43] In 1961, the United States Supreme Court explicitly overturned the Maryland provision in the Torcaso v. Watkins decision, holding that laws requiring "a belief in the existence of God" in order to hold public office violated freedom of religion provided for by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.[40][44][45] This decision is generally understood to also apply to witness oaths.[46]

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Cool. Your question was really bugging me. It just seemed inconceivable that you could get out of being a witness, but I hadn't spent the time to go a looking...or read the rest of that long article. :-)

Markw -

The bottom line is that all special interest groups, where they are based on religion, race, sex, or national ties exist for the purpose of changing laws that favor their group. Affirmative action is a prime example of how far reaching the efforts of these special interest groups play on society.

Back in the 70's I was told by the phone company (when I tried to apply for a job) that they were hiring only blacks and women so, in effect, they created a nation that discriminated against white males. I would have thought that the best approach would be to put everyone on equal ground and end discrimination for everyone, but their solution was to create discrimination against the one group that the Afro-American and feminists claimed were discriminating against them. I hardly call this good government, but in the end, it helped these special interest groups achieve their goals.

With politicians clamoring to get money for re-election, they have created laws that give corporate special interest groups an open door to directly influence our government. The end effect is that corporations, with their huge sums of money, sway politicians to vote in their favor instead of the people that vote for them. Politicians deny that the money affects their decisions, but only a fool would believe that.

Religion has had it their way for a very long time, but efforts have succeeded at squelching that advantage (in part) and returning this nation to the intent of the founders, which was a nation that allowed freedom of religion. What religious groups fail to understand is that there are many religions and those that don't believe, so that when any one group imposes their beliefs on the laws and governors of this nation, they are in effect destroying the very foundation of which this nation was formed.

There is another monster on the horizon, the feminist groups. Hanna Rosin wrote a book titled, “The End of Men” which makes note of how much better girls do in school, that they have become the largest portion of college students, and that they are, in ever increasing numbers, filling middle to upper management jobs in companies around the globe. On the surface it appears that women are stepping up to the plate and taking their place in modern society, but what the book fails to explain is why boys are doing less well in school than they have in the past and why are the businesses biased in their hiring practices against men. You can read and interpret this book either way, but ask enough questions and you will soon come to the conclusion that special interest groups are guiding this phenomena. The other thing to watch are the number of laws written to help women, at the expense of their male counter part.

The point is that all special interest groups exists for the purpose of helping their own kind at the expense of all other people who are not part of that group. I don't know how many special interest groups exists, only that there are many, all based on the idea that they are not being treated equally. The problem with these groups are that they are not striving for equality, rather the upper hand.

The only group that doesn't seem to be trying to get the upper hand are the Atheists. They seem to only want religious influence removed from government and their lives. If the movement grows, that may change someday and then it will be as biased and damaging as all the other special interest groups. However, I do support any special interest groups that has a legitimate basis for their complaints.

As for Canadians, I welcome their input as well as the input from anyone from any other nation. Many times, people that can see the situation from outside the box have a clearer understanding of the dynamics.

You have made some valid points which I fully support, but I too, think you're taking things a little too personal. BTW, I joined the military and even volunteered for duty in Viet Nam, so I imagine that I have your respect on that. Ironically, my days in service didn't increase my support for our nation, rather it made me question the motivations of our government.

StevenSurprenant

One of the reasons I liked the show Boston Legal is that the two leads were best friends - one a Democrat the other a Republican.

Questioning the government in a time of war is not anti-Americanism - it's one of the most patriotic things that you can do because you're putting your head in the guillotine. People were right to question Vietnam (I would say they were wrong to question the soldiers). Many soldiers were drafted and in today's army they often make promises to "poor" 18 year olds such as promising them 1 year of service and no combat and then having hidden clauses to keep them in for 20 years and throwing them into harm's way untrained.

How can a citizenry not question the government?

As for people from other counties questioning U.S. Government policy well that's no going to change mark - deal with it.

Many people view America the way America once viewed England and that's as an imperialistic nation trying to take over the planet. Ousting one dictator to place their own lapdog dictator in his place - selling arms to a dictator and then a decade later complaining they're getting unruly. Hussein was a U.S. appointed dictator who killed nearly hundreds of thousands of people and you can blame the liked of Dick Cheney and Haliburton and Regan for putting him in charge. But that's the kin dof history you don't want to read - you want to read the U.S. propaganda version from Faux news.

As for Canadian military history you might want to read up on it. I am not exactly sure if mark is trying to get a rise out of Canadian posters - basically arguing that we're more of a pacifist nation, and that we have less of a taste for killing is more a compliment.

Further - countries are lines on a map. Just as religious faith happens to be a result of what your parents taught you. If you were born in Pakistan you'd be Muslim and probably highly anti-American. We're creatures of our upbringing (according to science so yeah chuck that out right. :frown2:

RGA - We seemed to be aligned on most issues. I think you might enjoy reading the writings of a gentleman who goes by the moniker "The Desert Dweller". As far as I know he doesn't write for a living, but I have read some of his book reviews on Amazon and I find his thought processes to be extremely clear and focused. He is very anti conservative, but time after time he has demonstrated the ability to make his point clear. Of course, there are many who don't agree with him, but that's normal.

Amazon.com: Profile For The Desert Dweller: Reviews

If you do read this, be sure to read the Comments too. I think you will enjoy it.

Another book - lol - oh the list is getting long but I'll look for it.

I actually hate politics - the people elected are mouth pieces. All you can do is elect the lesser of two evils (or 4-5 evils in Canada).

In BC there are two provincial parties - teachers will mostly vote for the lefty NDP party because the Liberal party hates teachers, education and are basically crooks through and through. But people have short memories - the NDP proved to be crooks liars and buffoons which is why they got booted out resoundingly more than a decade ago. Sure their "philosophy" or what they "say" lines up with the ideology better but their actions didn't line-up.

Still, I suppose that's all you have in the end - to take them at their word that they're going to do what they say or at least most of what they say.

The outside perspective on your two candidates. Well at least Pakistan wants Romney. LOL. Seriously though sometimes an outside perspective can look at the two with dispassion and can call a sleazy used car nutcase easier than people who always vote party line cause their household always did.

And before someone says - "lefty countries always prefer lefties" take Canada - we have not only elected a "Right Wing (the earth is 6000 years old nutter" we RE-ELECTED him to a majority government!! And even these people are afraid of how bat-crap crazy Romney will be.

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Originally Posted by RGA

Another book - lol - oh the list is getting long but I'll look for it.

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No, the book is not important, it's the philosophical writings of "The Desert Dweller" that I find interesting. He's just a person who comments on the books.

As for, "I hate politics..."

Over time the left becomes the right and the right becomes the left.

Years ago I tried to get people on a political site to define left and right, liberal and conservative, and no one could do it. Many right wingers think that liberalism supports socialism/communism and that the conservatism supports a pure capitalistic system where people get out of it what they put into it, which they deem fair.

The problem is that neither idea can exist without creating problems of their own. Pure socialism/communism is based on sharing the wealth, but removes any motivation in the form of rewards for creativity or job performance. Hence, those nations become stagnant in terms of social and technological growth. Pure capitalism is based on rewarding people for their creativity and job performance, but in the long term, wealth becomes the bastion of a few while the ever increasing number of poor are left to fend for themselves.

I've heard many on the right vehemently complain about socialism, but where would we be without it? Our education system, health insurance, auto insurance, Social Security, roads, police, fire departments, and more are all based on socialism. Of course the definition of socialism is multifaceted and the part I am referring to is the unequal distribution of goods/services. For instance, we all pay for the education system, but only people with children derive any benefit out it. Most people never use the services of the police or the fire department but have paid for it their entire life.

The other aspect of socialism/communism that the right/capitalists seems to hate is that private ownership of property is not allowed, instead the government owns everything. The truth is that we own nothing. Sure we buy property, but then we have to pay the government property taxes in order to keep it. In a way it's a form of rent. In the end, even in a capitalistic society, the government still really owns all the property.

Getting back to the point...

CLP - Vanity Card #221

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CHUCK LORRE PRODUCTIONS, #221
We have once again arrived at a moment in history where the truth can be defined as "that which you can make other people believe." The methodology for creating that belief is repetition. Say something enough times and it becomes, for millions of people, the truth. I am endowed like a stallion. This is why control of the media equals control of the populace. I am endowed like a stallion. And also why a state run television news channel is so very dangerous. I am endowed like a stallion. Now there are those who would argue this has already happened and that a certain cable news channel is actually a covert extension of our government. I am endowed like a stallion. The fact that the channel is run by a high-ranking party official, an anchor person from the channel became a White House spokesman, and another top-ranking party official became an on-air news commentator is often used to make this argument. I am endowed like a stallion. Of course, this fact would be entirely inconsequential if the oft-repeated falsehoods they attempt to imbed into the Zeitgeist were simply amusing, or at worst, inane. I am endowed like a stallion. But, unfortunately, that is not the case. I am endowed like a stallion. The heavy repetition of lies and smears for political gain are by no means inconsequential. I am endowed like a stallion. Which is why each and every one of us must use whatever resources we have at our disposal to disseminate the actual truth. I am endowed like a pony.

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Originally Posted by StevenSurprenant

....I've heard many on the right vehemently complain about socialism, but where would we be without it? Our education system, health insurance, auto insurance, Social Security, roads, police, fire departments, and more are all based on socialism. Of course the definition of socialism is multifaceted and the part I am referring to is the unequal distribution of goods/services....

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i've never thought of social programs as being socialist in any sense. if a determining factor of socialism is the unequal distribution of goods and services, well... we've always had that with capitalism/democracy.

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Originally Posted by JohnMichael

Mark, I am sensing anger and bitterness from you. Everyone else is being civil but you. Your being able to rant and offend is proof we are impartial.

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The biggest whiners abourt religion and how it impacts our country are three canadians. Now, if they don't have enough to keep them occupied up there without butting into our business, well, then I feel I can note it. here as well.

As for their removing it from te vocabulary of this country, it ain't gonna happen. Atheists are as bad as muslims in their procolimations and bogus claims of being offended. Free speech assures that and simply because they are "offended" by the mere mention of things they see as religious, well, there's no guarantee nobody won't be offended. Remember, we have freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. Big difference. The atiests should get used to it and pull up their big boy pants.

In fact, offense seems to be a very effective way of getting publicity. Note Westboro. Those scum are dispiciple but, as the SCOUTS has ruled, they have the legal right to be scumbags as long as they follow certain precautions.

And, religious text and icons are built into buildings all over Washinton and the senate begins each day with a prayer, not tomention other ingrained areas as well.

Now, if someone wants to discuss audio or soccer, fine but if the main purpose of tis forum is to "dig" on groups you don't like, well, I'll play. but I do hope the mods keep the field level, though.

BTW, gas is really, really cheap in Colombus. I can see why you like it here. Be thankful for small favors. ...too many obama/bidet signs, though.

Markw, please show me where I have whined in this thread or said that I've been offended. I questioned RGA's claim. I found my answer. I shared my answer. End of story.

You seriously need to chill out man. Your blood pressure must be crazy high.

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Originally Posted by markw

The biggest whiners abourt religion and how it impacts our country are three canadians. Now, if they don't have enough to keep them occupied up there without butting into our business, well, then I feel I can note it. here as well.

As for their removing it from te vocabulary of this country, it ain't gonna happen. Atheists are as bad as muslims in their procolimations and bogus claims of being offended. Free speech assures that and simply because they are "offended" by the mere mention of things they see as religious, well, there's no guarantee nobody won't be offended. Remember, we have freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. Big difference. The atiests should get used to it and pull up their big boy pants.

In fact, offense seems to be a very effective way of getting publicity. Note Westboro. Those scum are dispiciple but, as the SCOUTS has ruled, they have the legal right to be scumbags as long as they follow certain precautions.

And, religious text and icons are built into buildings all over Washinton and the senate begins each day with a prayer, not tomention other ingrained areas as well.

Now, if someone wants to discuss audio or soccer, fine but if the main purpose of tis forum is to "dig" on groups you don't like, well, I'll play. but I do hope the mods keep the field level, though.

BTW, gas is really, really cheap in Colombus. I can see why you like it here. Be thankful for small favors. ...too many obama/bidet signs, though.

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Ya $2.97 a gallon is what one of our stations was today for a gallon of gas. If I knew you were in Columbus you could have bought me a very nice lunch.

I think it is fun that you copied what I wrote "Your being able to rant and offend is proof we are impartial". and you wrote what you did "but I do hope the mods keep the field level".

Mark you must be posting from a cell phone or a stroke recovery center. By the way it is not bidet but Obama/Biden. After all a bidet is something you can sit on to make you feel fresher.

Sorry I missed you in Ohio.

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Originally Posted by dingus

i've never thought of social programs as being socialist in any sense. if a determining factor of socialism is the unequal distribution of goods and services, well... we've always had that with capitalism/democracy.

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Exactly my point. We are a mixture of a number of ideologies. When people complain about social programs turning our nation into a socialist nation they don't seem to realize that in many ways we already are and they too benefit from numerous social programs.

Another example is that we keep calling ourselves a democracy, but once we walk out of the voting both then the democracy ends. After that we lose all rights on how the government is run. The only thing that keeps politicians in line is their strong desire to get re-elected.

We like to label things, but rarely do the labels we use describe what is true. That's one of the reasons the far right get's our support. They call themselves conservatives and so all the people who consider themselves conservative votes for them. Mostly everyone is a mixture of conservative or liberal depending on the issue so it's gets real confusing when we make a blanket claim about our stance. The same as when we support one party or the other, there are liberals and conservatives in both groups, depending on the issue.

Since I'm just rambling...

I've always liked to listen to the left media, liberal if you will, because they seemed to be more focused with presenting facts, but of late, they've become just as stupid and irritating as the far right media. Now, both present one fact and then spend the rest of their air time whining and misleading their listeners. Considering what goes for election campaigns, now a days, it's understandable. Both sides base their campaigns on trying to ruin the reputation of their opponent rather than point out their own virtues.

One last thing...

Parties scare the bejeebers out of me. I don't know much about them and I'm pretty sure they are not part of the elected government. As far as I am concerned, they are special interest groups acting in their own self interest to get people elected whom will support their interests. For all I know, a bunch of business men got together and created them for their own purpose. All they had to do was tell people what they wanted to hear (wave a carrot) to get them to vote for the candidate that would support their need for greed. Sure I'm paranoid about this, but who in their right mind wouldn't be?

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Originally Posted by RGA

Feanor

I tend to agree that many of these greedy people use religion merely to get people on board - unfortunately we can't know "for sure" but if we want to take the "Morality of Jesus" he'd hardly vote Republican. Yet somehow that party seems to own this religion. ...

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I've said over & over that the Christianity of the Christian Right isn't. It certainly bears little similarity to the compassionate attitude of Jesus or even of Paul.

With their narrow, ego-centric focus personal self-righteousness, and enforcing rules on other people, they more resemble the Pharisees, as characterized by Jesus in the Gospels, than adherents of Jesus. Accordingly I call them "neo-Pharisees".

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Originally Posted by StevenSurprenant

....Parties scare the bejeebers out of me. I don't know much about them and I'm pretty sure they are not part of the elected government. As far as I am concerned, they are special interest groups acting in their own self interest to get people elected whom will support their interests. For all I know, a bunch of business men got together and created them for their own purpose. All they had to do was tell people what they wanted to hear (wave a carrot) to get them to vote for the candidate that would support their need for greed. Sure I'm paranoid about this, but who in their right mind wouldn't be?

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that is a very accurate assessment. your feelings of paranoia on the matter are no doubt a result of wishful thinking.

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Originally Posted by Feanor

I've said over & over that the Christianity of the Christian Right isn't. It certainly bears little similarity to the compassionate attitude of Jesus or even of Paul.

With their narrow, ego-centric focus personal self-righteousness, and enforcing rules on other people, they more resemble the Pharisees, as characterized by Jesus in the Gospels, than adherents of Jesus. Accordingly I call them "neo-Pharisees".

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Funny, it looks to me that it's the atheists forcing their beliefs on believers by claiming offense every time they see a cross or christmas decoration in a pubic place, not unlike muslims do.

Apparently, church's in your area are prevented from opening and running soup kitchens, battered women's shelters, giving food to the poor, sending humanitarian aid in the form of sending food, medical supplies and building schools and hospitals in impoverished foreign countries, not to mention a plethora of other good works. It's not hard to find these if you tried at all to find this on the internet, assuming you care to do so.

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Originally Posted by markw

Funny, it looks to me that it's the atheists forcing their beliefs on believers by claiming offense every time they see a cross or christmas decoration in a pubic place, not unlike muslims do.
...

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Do I need to repeat this again? Atheists are skeptics who don't have "beliefs", ergo they can't force them on other people. It's so many religionists, (yes, certainly including Muslims), who like to force beliefs on others.

It might surprise you Mark but as a teacher I am 100% AGAINST the removal of Christmas in schools. So are most teachers I know (even the Atheist ones). I am fine with Christmas - the tree, Santa and ALL of the Christmas songs including all the ones that reference God.

That having been said I am also very much for having Halloween in schools letting the kids dress up in costume and getting candy. But teachers have very little say in what gets taught or what holidays or various social programs are taught in their classes or in schools. Usually some political hack outside the system trying to make a name of themselves get rid of singing the national anthem or removing Christmas.

So at least here we agree. You don't need to be Christian to enjoy Christmas and you don't need to be Christian to respect the "good messages" in the bible.

Battles over these things I suspect began because populations of schools and classrooms have shifted away from all white Christian based religious students to a representative population of students with a variety of people from all sorts of faiths.

In my practicum I prepared and was ready to teach "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" by CS Lewis (a Christian). No problems until parents of Jehovah Witness kids found out and freaked out on the school for teaching the book.

This is a government approved book - it's on the accepted list of books that teachers can teach. 2 kids out of 28 or so basically forced me to come up with a second program for their kids that their parents would approve. Aside from the fact that it's a tremendous amount of added work for the teacher, it also requires someone to watch them as they sit in a different classroom to study their approved book,

As you can probably tell, when teachers get confronted by P.C. policies of caving at every demand from each parent they have decided to take a middle road and remove any controversial things - perhaps in the states they also fear lawsuits - parents have taken schools to court over celebrating Halloween so it happens.

What happens though is the teacher and staff will learn from this and then when they get a class where they have a Jehovah Witness student they will simply dump "The Lion, The Witch..." and teach something else that won't require two separate less plans, a separate room and a second staff member to watch them. And to be safe - better not teach any book that has "fantasy" in it at all.

And the same for Christmas - I was going to have the kids make decoration cards with Christmas Trees, Angels, Santa Clause which they were excited about. Nope! The Johovah parents freaked out that it was Christmas and we were trying to indoctrinate them. I'm serious.

So I made a compromise and changed the decorations to snowflakes, snowmen, sleds, stars, and I kept the trees. I could justify that it was "seasonal" because when it snows it snows and a snowman is not really Christmas and the trees are aver BC so I said it was "the winter season." And STILL they complained because they "knew what those decorations "reall" meant." :mad2:

They pretty much pulled their kids out of school for most of December anyway.

The teaching of religious holidays is a part of Social Studies curriculum - therefore they should be taught in schools especially in Canada and the U.S. People need to know what large segments of a population believe in (that's the Study of Society).

I don't mind if the schools want to "add" the other religions because that also is a part of social studies but dumping Christmas in school is highly bothersome.

Oh please. Christmas isn't a religious occasion. It's a celebration of capitalism. Sure it's Christ's birthday and there are lots of folks who attend midnight mass. But for the most part it's cultural more than religious. There is no Santa Claus in the bible.

I was raised in a Jewish home and even we celebrated Christmas. We never had a tree, but we hung our stockings on our bedroom doors and in the morning we would wake up to full stockings and wrapped gifts outside our doors. We celebrated Hannukah too. Our parents would just split our gifts between the two holidays so that we never felt like we were missing out on anything.

My husband and I are both atheists and we decorate our house for Christmas and have Christmas dinner. Some years we get a tree and some years we don't bother. We always wake up and make a huge Christmas breakfast and then exchange gifts.

I don't understand people who are offended by Christmas trees and Santa Claus for religious reasons. There is nothing religious about trees or a fat man delivering gifts to children.

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Originally Posted by ForeverAutumn

Oh please. Christmas isn't a religious occasion. It's a celebration of capitalism. Sure it's Christ's birthday and there are lots of folks who attend midnight mass. But for the most part it's cultural more than religious. There is no Santa Claus in the bible.

I was raised in a Jewish home and even we celebrated Christmas. We never had a tree, but we hung our stockings on our bedroom doors and in the morning we would wake up to full stockings and wrapped gifts outside our doors. We celebrated Hannukah too. Our parents would just split our gifts between the two holidays so that we never felt like we were missing out on anything.

My husband and I are both atheists and we decorate our house for Christmas and have Christmas dinner. Some years we get a tree and some years we don't bother. We always wake up and make a huge Christmas breakfast and then exchange gifts.

I don't understand people who are offended by Christmas trees and Santa Claus for religious reasons. There is nothing religious about trees or a fat man delivering gifts to children.

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You are right it is more of a commercial holiday and it is more pagan than christian. They know when taxes were paid and it was not in December so Jesus was not born on 12/25. That date coincides with the celebration of the Yule. The yule log and the christmas tree were part of the pagan celebration of the winter solstice. Religions adapt as humans change and grow which to me is the greatest sign that religions are man made.