Christmas

It's been said before, but... I think it's interesting to note that Christmas has become so divorced from its Christian roots and has become primarily a capitalist holiday. Sure, Christmas is still an important holiday in the Christian calendar and is duly celebrated by many faithful in memoriam of the birth of the prophet Yesu bin Yosef. But studying Christmas from a purely phenomenological perspective I think is very revealing. The majority of thought and effort related to Christmas regards the purchase of vast quantities of stuff--presents, food, decorations, music, and on and on. This is something that can be shared across cultural lines, anywhere the cult of materialism and work has taken hold. It is the most important, indeed the only important, holiday in the capitalist calendar, a time when lost revenues from a few days' vacation are more than compensated for by the orgy of consumption that has paved the way for this rest, which we all sorely need after the nerve-wracking experience of holiday shopping. (Especially if the 'we' in question is quite poor in the midst of all this largess. It takes an advanced soul, indeed, to not feel the bitterness of poverty in such circumstances.) Fat merchants chuckle over their fatter balance sheets as we rest atop the piles of junk we've dutifully purchased, loyal subjects. Every year they exhort us to buy more (must keep the economy growing!) and every year we faithfully obey. It is the only way the cult of materialism knows how to fete itself, by growing yet another appendage. We all participate and wonder at all of our things, these chimera of the natural world we neither need nor, after a few days or weeks, want. This is the only transcendence materialism can offer. And we love it. We are all rapt devotees, myself included. It may be sick, but what an illness!