The True Meaning of Christmas

The True Meaning of Christmas

From their earliest years, children in the West are taught that
material things are created by Magic under the North Pole by
cute little Elves and delivered using Flying Reindeer to their
homes by a Jolly Fat Mature Male Elf named "Santa Claus". Father
Christmas...A Male Authority Figure.

Santa Claus will be generous and bring lots of goodies only if
they are "Good Little Boys and Girls", meaning that they have
obeyed all Authority Figures without question, especially by
believing what they are told to believe about the way their
countries and the world works.

And because all these wonderful goodies are associated with the
Birth of Jesus, then Jesus (God) must very much approve of wanton
materialism. Why would people exchange gifts on His birthday if
such practices didn't have His approval?

These are potent images and ideas and emotions. And parents are
very careful to make sure their children believe in them for as
long as possible.

Later on, when the children go to school, they are not taught
anything that will really dispel this myth. They are not taught
about how Industry works, the destruction to the environment
it causes. They are not taught about the exploited labor here
and abroad (mostly abroad) that forms the foundation of the
Industrial-Capitalist system.

They see images of apparently spiffy factories filled with happy
workers where all these goodies appear as if by magic at the end
of production lines.

They are not given a real education in industrial-technology,
because that would give them an accurate picture of what their
lifestyle does to the world.

How many people in this society with PhDs don't even know that
you need a coal mine, a limestone quarry, and an iron ore mine
just to begin the process of making steel?

The most technologically-advanced countries on the planet are
very careful to make sure that most of their citizens are utterly
ignorant of technology. Isn't that just bizarre?

Don't worry! All this stuff is made using Magic by cute little
happy Elves living under the North Pole. Consume! Leave all that
technical stuff to the specialists. It's S-O-O-O boring!

And what do they see in their lives, most of them? Stuff
appearing by seeming Magic in the stores. Or in the mails.

Those that go to church are carefully guided away from the core
teachings of Jesus, which are definitely anti-materialistic:

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Lk = Luke
Mt = Matthew
Mr = Mark

MAM'MON (Greek. from the Aramaic. mamona, "wealth").

A word that speaks of wealth (Mt 6:24; Lk 16:9,11,13. Mammon is a
transliteration of the Aramaic word mamon, which means "wealth,
riches," or "earthly goods."

The love of which Jesus *specifically* prohibited:

Modern versions have "money," "gold," and "material possessions."
Jesus said that no one can serve two masters-- God and money--
at the same time. Nor can mammon (money) purchase security (Lk
12:13-21). "For what is a man profited if he gains the whole
world, and loses his own soul?" (Mt 16:26; Mr 8:36; Lk 9:25).

"No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one
and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and
despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

"Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you
will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you
will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than
clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor
reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them.
Are you not of more value than they?

"Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature? So
why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the
field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say
to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like
one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which
today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much
more clothe you, O you of little faith?

"Therefore do not worry, saying, ?What shall we eat?' or ?What
shall we drink?' or ?What shall we wear?' For after all these
things the peoples of the world seek. For your heavenly Father
knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom
of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added
to you." {Mt 6:24-34)

And this is from the Old Testament:

"Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be content
with what you have; for he has said, 'I will never leave you
or forsake you.' So we can say with confidence, 'The Lord is
my helper; I will not be afraid. What can anyone do to me?'"
(Hebrews 13:5 & 6)

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Christmas is the myth and ritual whereby mindless consumers are
created. And psuedo-Christians who gnore most of the teachings of
Jesus.

Our children are, literally, brainwashed.


Littlefoot

 

oh just shut up already. why do you have to take an innocent thing and warp it so you can bash something? such pessimism....

 

Christmas is hardly innocent.

The Victorian age was probably Christmas at it's finest hour as a celebration. This is where we get a lot of our holiday traditions. With the advent of radio and TV and mass programming, it has degenerated into a greedy capitalist feeding frenzy.

People are herded like cattle so they can be milked for their money.

I distance myself from that part of it and concentrate on the good it STILL does. Bringing family and friends together under a spirit of good will. And of course, being invited for dinner somewhere ain't such a bad thing either.



x

 

maybe instead of filling your head with images of crowded malls and department stores, you should think of all the families on Christmas. Together happily exchanging gifts that really don't mean anything anyways. just enjoying each other's company. i dont understand what is so bad. for every gift that is received, one was given also.

 

Littlefoot:

"Don't worry! All this stuff is made using Magic by cute little
happy Elves living under the North Pole."

FedUpAmerican:


"This is the only part that I disagree with.

This stuff is now being made in sweatshops in China, Honduras and Equador by cute little third world elves."

I guess that was just a clumsy paragraph. It was meant to represent what is being
taught to the children.

Nothing new about exploited labor around the world. In the early part of the 20th
century, for example, the U.S. Marines invaded Nicaragua 19 times on behalf of
the United Fruit Company. (Now known as "Chiquita Banana".)

Littlefoot

 

That's the whole point: There's nothing innocent about it, unless you are
wearing blinders.

How's the fit? They nice and snug? Wouldn't want to let any light in.

Littlefoot

 

You apparently didn't read my post at all.

Just saw that your pet ritual was being criticized and posted a
kneejerk response.

I don't celebrate Xmas. None of my friends do. We don't have any problem
getting together with each other and our families and sharing love.

As for sharing material gifts, that's just a scam perpetrated by greedy
merchants.

One obviously doesn't need to give and receive material gifts to share
love. Everyone in this society already has way too much stuff anyway.

I guess it doesn't bother you that being materialistic is contrary to
the teachings of Jesus.

That's very typical of the people in America who _claim_ to be
Christians.

Littlefoot

 

xexon,

The folks I know get together at a different time because we don't want to
have anything to do with Xmas or the psuedo-Christians of America.

The food is still good

And no one goes into debt just to buy gifts for people who have too much
material crap already.

Xmas without the downside. I love it.



LIttlefoot

 

i like how your theory of how every christian is brainwashed and a pseudo-christian. If we weren't the majority, you wouldn't even have an opinion on us. i guess that makes it easier to deal with us in the even that it might be right?


so you are telling me that it is not ok that things are made in sweatshops during the christmas season, but it is ok when they are made during the duration of the other 364 days? your telling me that you never purchase any goods that aren't made in this country? only christians do in december right? that's just foolish....quit being delusional b/c you are just as bad as anyone else.

take the blinders off and let some light in...

 

Perhaps xmas was ok for rich victorians. As for the poor of the 19th c. they had a pretty rough ride xmas or no xmas.
Read Dickens 'A Christmas Carol'.

 

From what I understand, the idea of christmas actually came from the pagans and was the worship of the evergreen tree. From what little I have read on the subject, in the conifer forests located all over the old world, around this time of year, the pagans would visit these forests and search for the "presents" that were underneath these trees. These presents were actually the red topped and white speckled mushroom of the amanita muscaria type hence the red and white theme of christmas and us all having these conifer trees in our homes to recieve these gifts. Anyone else ever hear of this theory?

 

You sure do behave like the typical, arrogant psuedo-Christian bully.

You claim to know all about me when you know nothing about me and didn't
even bother trying to find out anything about me.

I live at less than half the official poverty line. I have almost no material
posessions. This old computer running the free operating system, Linux,
is the only electronic device in my home other than the phone, which doesn't
have long-distance.

I eat only plants, mostly from my own gardens, which are worked entirely
by hand. I do my laundry by hand. My electreicity bill last month was $12.
I have no car. I have no children (because the world is incredibly over-
populated). No insurance, no bank account. I haven't been to a doctor
in maybe 30 years.

No, asshole, I don't live like you.

(I deleted an excessively rude remark here that I apologize for.)

Littlefoot

 

Sure. Soma, the Magic Mushroom. But regardless of what cultural traditions were
borrowed to create the current psuedo-Christian ritual, it doesn't change the truth
of what I posted. It is now a tool used to brainwash almost all the children, regardless
of whether they live in psuedo-Christian households or not.

The idea is to get them thinking that material things are the most wonderful
things in the world and that if they don't have a lot of them that they are
bad people. And that all that material stuff is created without harming the
environment or making war or exploiting poor people.

Remember, the kids have the Xmas myths pounded into their heads for
many years. Their formative years.

This is truly disgusting. Obviously, there's nothing in the New Testament
to justify exchanging gifts on Jesus' birthday. And nothing about flying
reindeer and fat elves.

In fact, they whole Xmas celebration is just another example of how
the psuedo-Christians ignore most of what Jesus taught.

Not only His anti-materialist teachings but the fact that He didn't ask
anyone to celebrate His birthday.

LIttlefoot

 

Hare Krishna!


From Littlefoot
.............
.....Those that go to church are carefully guided away from the core
teachings of Jesus, which are definitely anti-materialistic:

Then again From Littlefoot.....

......In fact, they whole Xmas celebration is just another example of how the psuedo-Christians ignore most of what Jesus taught.

Not only His anti-materialist teachings but the fact that He didn't ask
anyone to celebrate His birthday.

...................................................................................................

I am not sure whether I qualify to join this thread but could not resist my inner force to extend my sincere gratitude and thanks to dear Littlefoot. I only know this much that Lord Jesus and His teachings are getting covered by the present day teachers, their confused thoughts and opportunistic ideas & explanations.

I am sorry if I have hurt anybody, but this automatically comes to my mind when I see millions of Christians are raising their doubts and moving away to other religions and their teachers. Alas ! It is a great pity that people do not understand that if Jesus is not enough then nobody else is enough, even all others put together is not enough!

Love,

Kumar.

 

I'm generally in agreement that if a person from a Christian background rejects Christianity wholesale, they won't get far looking into other religions.
Despite all the deviation and the false teachings which have accrued around it, it still contains a core spiritual message which is really no different from the message of Buddhism, Hinduism or any other genuine spiritual path.
If modern Christians fail to truly understand their own religion, it is probably because the thing has become very much corrupted and made into something rather shallow.
There is a huge difference between for example the Christianity of the mystically inclined catholic and the 'happy clapper' type of baptist etc.
Many modern Christian traditions seem to me entirely without any real spiritual depth.
When one encounters the real thing, say in the company of Benedictine brothers, it is clear that it is indeed just another aspect of the true universal religion.

 

Hello, Kumar. You are more than welcome. The truth is, I am sorry to say,
that most 'Christians' these days actually worship technology, not Jesus.

Their true religion is physical science. Who do they turn to if they get sick?
God? Nope. They go running to the medical doctors....

And technology is very materialistic, isn't it? That would be the worship of
Mammon.

"You cannot serve two masters..."

But don't misunderstand me here. I am not in any sense a Christian.

Kindly read my response to BlackBillBlake.

LIttlefoot


Littlefoot

 

I'm basically with you, BBB. God, All That Is, The Spirit That Moves In All Things,
has sent many Teachers to us over the millennia. And most of us have grossly
misunderstood what they tried to teach us.

For one thing, worshipping these Teachers is a grand mistake. It wasn't Jesus
or Buddha that mattered, but their message. Nor can any of them do anything
for us other than guide us to a true understanding of the nature of reality.

When the blind person regained their sight in Jesus' presence, He said:
"Your belief has healed you." (That is sometimes translated as "faith"
rather than "belief". Same concept.)

He _did_not_ say, "Your faith in me", though that is how most people who
call themselves Christians choose to interpret His meaning.

That's one of the core Teachings of all of the true messengers from God.
We make our own realities with our beliefs. That's why prayer is so
effective. And hypnosis. And chanting mantras. And creative visualization...

In John 14, Jesus said that we would do all that He had done, and more.

Carlos Castaneda, in the chronicle of his apprenticeship with a shaman
in northern Mexico, recorded:

Don Juan: "The world is so-and-so because we tell ourselves
it is so-and-so." (Tales of Power)

Seth, a contemporary Teacher 'channeled' by Jane Roberts,
says the same thing: The physical universe is idea construction.
The spirit becomes flesh and manifests its conceptions of reality.

http://www.sethcenter.com

http://mssa.library.yale.edu/findaids/stream.php?xmlfile=mssa.ms.1090.xml

This quotation from the Mahayana Texts of the Pali Canon, and
the accompanying commentary is relevant:

Everything Is Controlled By the Mind

The passage below comes from the Cloud of Jewels Sutra. It
indicates that all phenomena are productions of mind and
that everything is created by mind. Ordinary beings allow
the mind to wander at will, thus enmeshing them in confused
and harmful thoughts, but bodhisattvas are advised to train
the mind in order to bring it under control:

"All phenomena originate in the mind, and when the mind is
fully known all phenomena are fully known. For by the mind
the world is led...and through the mind karma is piled up,
whether good or bad. The mind swings like a firebrand, the
mind rears up like a wave, the mind burns like a forest
fire, like a great flood the mind carries all things away.
Bodhisattvas, thoroughly examining the nature of things,
remain in ever-present mindfulness of the activity of the
mind, and so do not fall into the mind's power, but the mind
comes under their control. And with the mind under their
control, all phenomena are under their control."[61]

------------------------------------------------------------

61Ratnamegha-sÒtra, from the/ik[[hungarumlaut]]>samuccaya,
ed. Cecil Bendall (Osnabruck: BiblioVerlag, 1970), pp.
121-122.

/quote

http://www.anu.edu.au/asianstudies/buddhism/maha.html

The Pali Canon is to Buddhism what the Bible is to Christianity.

We are made in the image of God. And what do we know for sure
about God? Not what It looks like, that's for sure.

We know that God is a creator.

Littlefoot

 

i dont claim to know shit about you. it was a generalized statement. you people attack christians all the time, but no one is any better than they are. no one is any worse either. love everyone man. and if anyone is generalizing, it's you.

all christians are bad. all christians are sheep. all christians are arrogant, pseudo-christians who don't really practice faith b/c they go to the doctor and have things. if i followed everything that Jesus said word for word, then i would basically be Jesus. I can't. Im not good enough to be like that I can admit that. He is something to strive for. Sorry Im just aggravated. I am a REAL christian and have REAL faith believe it or not. I just wonder why i have to live in the world and deal with daily attacks from people like you.

 

basically, my whole point is just that christianity is about PEACE and LOVE.


it isn't about who can be the poorest, or who can starve themselves the longest, or who does and who doesn't have electricity. that's the whole point. you don't have to be poor to have faith. EVERYONE can become a christian. there is no specific guidelines for it. in the end God, loves us all.

 

You don't have to look very far into Christianity to see the answer.

It's about peace and love - but more than that too. It is about God isn't it?