The Church of No People

In the spirit of holiday regifting, I’m dredging up another classic holiday blog post, rewritten and repackaged with a bright shiny bow!

I feel bad for people who don’t celebrate Christmas.  It’s a great holiday.  I feel almost as bad for you, as I do for the vegans who do celebrate Christmas.  They’re stuck eating Tofurky for Christmas dinner.  Doesn’t that look tasty?

And then some teetotaller shows up, and I guess I’m supposed to feel bad about being on my fourth hot toddy at 11 in the morning. 

So to clarify, you Christmas Vegans are a pain because your actions make me look bad.  While I’m talking about the iPod I got for Christmas, you are talking about the soup kitchen you spent all Christmas working at.  It makes me feel a little self conscious, and I’ll thank you to stop.  I feel I need to drop the phrase “reason for the season” into conversation with you, or recite the King James version of the Christmas story a la Linus from Charlie Brown.

I need you to know that I love Jesus, perhaps even more than you do.  I just love eggnog, cookies, and giving (and getting) presents too.  In fact, I can love presents and Jesus, because I just have lots of love in my heart.  Some people have enough love for big families.  I have enough love for big presents.  And I’m sorry you have such a small Grinch heart so you cannot understand that.  I’m not going to stop enjoying those things just because a bunch of pagans do that too.  Guess what?  A bunch of pagans go to church on Christmas too.  There.  I am justified.  You have nothing on me.  Enjoy your tofurky, I have a doorbuster deal to grab.

And yet…

I find myself drawn in.  There are definately more Christmas Vegans this year, I’ve noticed.  Or at least Christians who are indulging in less.  Maybe it’s the economy.  But maybe people are genuinely tired of the Christmas rat race.

And I am starting to feel the same way.  Your Christmas stinginess and scroogery is making me re-evaluate my own habits.  My wife and I realized we could simplify our Christmas just by trimming the budget.  Novel idea!  For example, we have yet to buy a Christmas tree, ever. Our tree is a trade made with my brother.  We also decided we’d trim our gifts that we purchase down by $5-$10 each.  We have also made a point that we will not visit the movies on Christmas.  That’s just our thing, and I won’t judge you if your family does go to the movies (though you are free to feel judged.) 

Wow, I can see why you Christmas Vegans are going for a simpler holiday.  I feel holier about myself already, just by telling you all that!  Do you need to re-read that list of holy things I’m doing to get some ideas about how to improve yourself?  I think I need a reward for being so awesome.  Maybe a couple extra cookies tonight.

Are you a Christmas vegan? A carnivore? What’s your favorite “worldly” part of Christmas? What part do you wish would go away?  Are you simplifying your Christmas, or do you revel in every candy cane?

Well, by now we’re knee deep in Christmas cheer. 

That means we’re scrambling from store to store, and from one workplace party to the next, and from one Christmas pagaent to another.  And all the while, the singers on the radio are seranading us with season’s greetings.

And by about this time each year, I’ve had enough musical holiday cheer to make me want to go live at the North Pole…and be a hermit.

Christmas is the time when musicians oftentimes put away their deft musical instincts and crank up the hokiness to eleven.  While most Christmas hymns are timeless and not terrible, the same cannot be said for secular Christmas music.  What we get is an avalanche of grating, insipid, repetitive songs that make us wish Christmas only came once every ten years.

Yet, there is a silver lining.  If I were a radio DJ at Christmas, here’s what I would, and would never play.

Don’t play it: Feliz Navidad

This song must be the result of the worst case of writer’s block in history.

I thought we were past our little Chipmunk phase.  Back when records were high tech, some genius came up with the amazing idea of speeding it up, and thus the chipmunks were born. Hey, every generation of kids has to have something to annoy the living daylights out of their parents.  Then we moved on to other annoying obsessions. 

Ho Ho Ho!

In just a couple of weeks, jolly old St. Nick will decend through chimneys worldwide to deliver the toys most wanted by greedy little children. Endless weeks of dreaming, begging, wishing and pretending to behave will be fulfilled as children unwrap the toys they have most coveted.

Santa’s supposed to be an expert on what children want. And yet, many times, Santa’s gifts deliver not just joy to children, buy buyer’s remorse to parents. This is surprising, considering parents are supposed to have the last say on what Santa can deliver.

One of the most troublesome genre of toys are the dolls. Children love to have little playmates that can’t hit back or tattle like a baby brother can. Dolls, action figures and plush toys fill this need for role models/playmates/whipping boys. Unfortunately, these happen to be some of the most annoying toys Santa can deliver…maybe even more annoying than Santa delivering an extra child to your door!

Maybe you parents ought to check Santa’s list twice after considering these popular nightmare toys Santa punished naughty parents with in years’ past.

Remember when Santa brought these for Christmas…

Furby
It took Americans about 20 minutes to realize Furbies were evil. But it was too late. They were already in our homes, and we paid Santa a billion dollars to put them there. Furby constantly wanted attention, (in the form of you bringing him more Furbies.) The only way to make Furby shut his furry trap was to throw him in the closet and try to get him out of your nightmares, hoping he wouldn’t wake up. But Furby still lurks in the dark corners of your home…somewhere…waiting…

Talking Barney
For some reason, American parents of the last generation took a break from Sesame Street, and entrusted the early education of their children to a man wearing a giant purple dinosaur suit, who sang some of the most vapid, worthless songs ever sang by a man in a giant purple dinosaur suit. I know, it sounds like that would be perfect preparation for public schooling. But Barney is only on TV for a couple of hours a day! What is a child to do for the other 23 mercifully Barney-free hours? The only thing that made Barney entertaining was giving him to the dog while hearing him sing “I love you, you love me…”

Singing/Laughing/Talking/Chicken Dancing Elmo
Sesame Street recaptured the magic (witchery) that Barney was trying to steal, by unleashing their most irritating, overlooked character on masses of mushy minds. Elmo is the Jar-Jar Binks of Sesame Street, and has appeared in all manner of ungodly forms, designed to delight children, and enrage parents. Like kids need any help learning how to annoy others, Elmo has to teach them how to chicken dance. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Sesame Street, please, take a note from George Lucas and drop Jar-Jar. Tell everyone he went out for cigarettes. After all, Elmo will stunt childrens’ growth even more than the cigarettes that are marketed to them. Thanks, Santa.

Bratz
Girls today need role models to look up to. Barbie is too irrelevant to speak to the real issues of womankind today. It’s a shame that today, a girl might grow up to be 12 or even 13 before learning how to dress like a spoiled valley girl, turned hooker. The sooner girls can be taught that reading is cool, especially when the words are printed on your naughty bits, the better. My theory is the dolls keep showing up at Christmas because they’re the Christmas elves’ ideal of feminine beauty…or adult film stars. Their image of what real elf women look like is so warped.

The Steve Urkel Doll
Steve Urkel was the comically annoying neighbor on “Family Matters,” which is probably the last decent sitcom ABC has produced. The show centered around Steve weaseling himself into the ordinary lives of his neighbors, with hilariously irritating and destructive results. Somehow, while the Winslows were always trying to keep Steve out of the house, Santa thought every other American home should invite Steve into their homes, complete with a pull-string and five of his most “popular” annoying phrases. Somehow, my parents, with their otherwise stellar record of wise parenting, were punished with not just one, but two Urkel dolls in their home, one for me, and the other for my brother. We were cleaning out our parents’ basement a few months ago, and who should we find? Same old Urkel, and the pull-string still worked! How can something die that had no soul to begin with?

A Puppy
The only thing more annoying than any of these dolls is Santa bringing a child a puppy for Christmas. Say what you will about Steve Urkel, at least he never crapped on your rug. I even give Elmo more credit than that. (I don’t think there’s a “Crap on the Rug Elmo.”) Why does everyone think “Marley” is endearing? Sure he was cute on the surface, kind of like a Mitch Albom book. But he was a terrible dog…kind of like a Mitch Albom book, and his owners were the worst kinds of owners for letting him be that way!

I’m not saying don’t get a puppy. It’s just really hard to “give away” the Christmas puppy if he turns out to be a spawn of Satan’s dog.

Beware, the same Santa who brought you these is the same man who has the power to fill your homes with Hannah Montana! Fear him!

Ah, the joy of Christmas.

What are some of the most annoying gifts Santa has blessed you or your children with?

Did you notice it? The eggnog in the dairy case at the store…

It’s beckoning you.

Since Christmas music and plastic Santas now show up in stores before Halloween, they can’t be trusted with the duty of ringing in the Christmas season. They blew it in a big way, and the torch must be passed.

So now, the official sign of the holidays for me is the quiet, yet giddy return of the eggnog.

So as I sit down with my first of many glasses of eggnog this season, I thought it was appropriate to rewrite an old gem of a blog post from long ago. And by “long ago,” I mean last year, because that’s when my blog started.

Yes, to me eggnog is the perfect holiday beverage. Dare I say, it is the finest beverage ever invented since melted ice cream. It is truly fit for a king’s grail, wedding toasts, or christening ships. I postulate that lactose intolerant people give up celebrating Christmas, because it just isn’t worth it. Eggnog is the most appropriate beverage for Christmas, and Christmas is the most appropriate day for eggnog.

And that being the case, that means that every other day is a slightly less appropriate one for eggnog. The most inappropriate day for eggnog? June 25. That’s Jesus’ un-birthday. Jesus doesn’t celebrate un-birthdays; he thinks they’re stupid. In fact, if your birthday is on June 25, I’d just keep that a secret.

Yes, the occasions for the viscous dairy treat are very specific, and we risk hurting ourselves should we attempt to make eggnog a part of inappropriate activities. The government tries to protect us by outlawing it before Thanksgiving. However, there are still plenty of opportunities to make eggnog a completely inappropriate choice for liquid refreshment even during the holiday season. I submit to you some occasions and places where eggnog is a bad choice:

The Movies
Good idea: sneaking candy and a small soda into the theater in your wife’s purse. Cheap snacks, and she takes the fall if you get caught by that teenage usher with the baton flashlight.

Better idea: Flaunting the rules in an awesomely inappropriate way by sneaking in not just a small bottle, but a ludicrous amount of eggnog to the movies in your wife’s purse.

If theaters don’t want patrons sneaking in eggnog, they should sell it themselves. I think it would be worth it and awesome to get caught by one of the ushers with more eggnog than any one person could possibly drink in one sitting. Say, a couple of half gallons. It just makes me think of Dan Ackroyd stuffing that giant salmon under his filthy gray Santa beard in Trading Places.

The Gym
Maybe you’ve been booking it on the treadmill for like 10 minutes, and if you’re anything like me, you’re about to pass out. Actually, if you’re anything like me, you’re laughing quietly at the person on the treadmill while eating a chicken fried steak.

Anyway, the sweat is dripping off of you. So you take your squirt bottle and squeeze it into your mouth, and maybe a little on your head and dab yourself with a stale gym towel. If you’re in a Gatorade commercial, you dump Gatorade on your head, because everyone knows flavored sugar water is better for cooling off than regular water.

Know what isn’t good for cooling off during a sweaty workout? Eggnog. Try as you might, it just doesn’t work. Know what the worst combination of smells is? Gym sweat, regurgitated eggnog, and a bunch of strangers’ ‘sympathy’ vomit. That’s what you will have.

The Cocktail Party
To a lot of people, one of the highlights of the holidays is putting on a fuzzy sweater and sharing some “holiday cheer” in a champagne flute, and then inarticulately “singing” the New Year’s song. (Kind of like how we “sing” the National Anthem.) Some amateur might feel it’s appropriate to put eggnog on his turbulent tummy after a few cocktails. This is a guarantee no one will meet you under the mistletoe, ever. There’s some kind of college frat-boy adage, “beer before liquor – never been sicker.” A similar old adage applies here, “booze before eggnog, you’re an idiot.”

The Nursing Home
Let’s be honest. Eggnog bloats your digestive tract and makes you smell like death. And when it comes to old people, their sense of hearing and smell has probably deteriorated. Combine that with that general “who cares, I’m 96″ attitude that old people get, and you have a recipe for disaster.

Communion
I’m on the fence here. While eggnog is a beverage fit for a king’s grail, would it really be fit for the holy grail? I’m inclined to say yes, yes it is. If I were one of the twelve disciples, I would’ve made sure there was eggnog available. Then again, eggnog might send all the Catholics into some kind of existential crisis or something. Maybe the Baptists could pull it off, since it’s just a memorial to them anyway…provided you keep the booze out of it.

On second thought, better just steer clear of that one.

Eggnog is great, but only in the right places, kind of like dogs or children or Sean Penn.

Actually, that’s a pretty good rule of thumb. Any place you wouldn’t want to see Sean Penn, you shouldn’t bring eggnog. Please refer to the above. See what I mean? I think I’m on to something.

What other places and times would delicious eggnog be a terrible choice?

I hope everyone had a great Easter: big church celebrations, Easter egg hunts, dinner with family, visitors at church.

I made up a new postcard to send to church visitors who show up on Easter. You can borrow it if you like…

What? We do hope they’ll come back for Christmas, right?

How about that ridiculously tiny church, huh? It’s real. Some crazy Dutch guy built it a hundred years ago. Now it sits in someone’s pasture and people get married in it.

Ever since there has been Easter, there have been Easter ‘squatters,’ those people who, for one reason or another, see fit to get their butts to church on Easter, and maybe on Christmas if they’re in town and at no other time of year. Random people showing up for the big show is a tradition that dates back all the way to the first Resurrection Sunday…

“When [the women] came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to Steve.” Luke 24:9

All right, it doesn’t exactly say that, but it does say this…

“When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and the others.” Luke 24:9

Whenever I need a random guy for a story, I turn to Steve. He’s always at the ready to drop into a perfectly good story for no reason. So you see, Luke records conclusive proof in a vaguely defined pronoun that the disciples had random people show up for that first Easter.

Christians have an interesting relationship with these folks. Easter is when churches really roll out the red carpet for visitors. The minister gives his best sermon. The musicians play the best songs. The church serves the best food. The church spends lots of cash on egg hunts and petting zoos and moon walks and all kinds of fun ‘Easter’ junk, which won’t be there the next week. And the regulars smile and greet the visitors and try to believe that some of these people will come back, before Christmas.

That’s a pretty nice racket these guys have going on. They show up only on the best Sunday of the year! Then they skip out on all the mediocre Sundays – the youth Sundays, the student preacher Sundays, the after Christmas when no one shows up to church Sundays.

But, changing a life habit is hard. It’s a real interruption to your routine to cut your Sunday sleep short. (Although I contend that 10:30 is plenty late to still allow sleeping in.) It’s tough to get the kids dressed and out the door an extra day. It’s tough to tell Little League Coach that no, we won’t be playing a game on Sunday morning. It’s tough to not take those hours to do housework or eat pancakes.

Sometimes, I wish I lived in a small town. Small towns have nothing to do except go to church! A city has everything to do besides go to church.

Some of us have been going to church so long, it’s hard to understand how hard it must be to give up that time. And some of us actually get paid to be at church, so that makes it super easy to be there!

Okay, I’m done defending them…

We got a little burned last year. We went all out for Easter. We sent out a month-long campaign of mailers to a few thousand people. We rented a space at the community center. We showed up the week before to rehearse. We spent all of our money. A few families showed up. A few families makes a big difference in a tiny church. We couldn’t be anything big and fancy, but we played our best music, gave them our best preaching. We visited with them. We fed them brunch. We followed up with them that afternoon. We brought them cookies. They all said they’d be back.

Yeah right. Thanks for getting our hopes up.

And this year, we got rained out. We were going to be in the park. Sometimes I think I’m cursed.

It’s not like we only give you cookies the first time you visit. We have food every week! What do you want?!

I know we’re all good Christians and we’re all going to say that we’re so glad to see these visitors hear the good news, they need all the exposure they’re willing to get, etc. We would all gladly give up our seats for these people. We are gracious about their kids not knowing how to act in church. But how do you really feel about it? How do you feel about getting lip-service from a visitor who acts all excited about your church, and then they vanish forever?

I’m not mad. But I can’t help being disappointed, both for my people, myself and for the visitors, because I know what they’re missing. I can’t help but feel our ‘Easter squatters’ reflect on me as a vessel of God. Surely if I was someone great, they’d come back! They’d make time, they’d write a big fat check, right? I honestly don’t know what we could have done better to get them to come back, other than be a humongous church with an amusement park. Maybe I could have whitened my teeth…

Are these people deliberately just renewing their ‘fire insurance’ policy for the next six months, or are they just not aware of what they’re doing?

Is Easter the biggest opportunity for evangelism, or do we just spend all our cash thinking it is?

Hey, no amount of Easter squatters can take away my Easter, no matter what. I hope that’s the same for you.