For several years, some liberals have demanded Orwellian newspeak to replace the phrase, “Merry Christmas” with a more ambiguous and supposedly less offensive “Happy Holidays” — but no one is buying it.
It isn’t just the language surrounding Christmas that is being threatened with erasure, it’s the traditions and the very religion that animate the “holiday” season that have been eroded in the past several years.
A vast majority of Americans still celebrate Christmas, rough estimates place the current percentage of Americans who recognize the holiday anywhere from 85 percent to over 90 percent. However, how they recognize the holiday has changed significantly over time, as society has become less traditionally religious and more doctrinally liberal.
A strict adherence to the “separation of church and state” — a statement often decontextualized and manipulated for political means — and a collective abandonment of Christian norms and traditions that inspired the country’s founders has created a greater divide among Americans.
Gallup polling found that just 71% of Americans today consider Christmas a “strongly or somewhat religious holiday for them” compared to 82% just a decade ago. Correspondingly, Daily Infographic reported that just 65% of Americans attend religious services to celebrate the Christmas season.
As levels of church attendance steadily decrease, Christmas giving has consistently increased. Daily Infographic adds, “Christmas is without a doubt the biggest holiday in the United States, and accounts for a significant portion of economic activity in each calendar year.”
In fact, Christmas-related sales have increased year-over-year for the past decade, and “Last year’s holiday season sales totaled approximately $936.3 billion. That’s more than double 2004’s figure of $467.2 billion.”
But as spending has increased, young Americans’ interest in spending quality time with family has decreased. According to YPulse data, “[When] given the choice, a quarter of young North Americans would rather be spending time with their friends than their family over Christmas.” The outlet also reports that “Over two in five young North Americans plan to celebrate Christmas with their friends.”
The US has undoubtedly been on a steady cultural decline, and one simple way to counteract the effects in your own life is to look at the facts, the trends, and the data — and consider doing the exact opposite. Get plugged into a local church or community group, spend more quality time with family, and less money on material goods — if conservatives commit to these simple traditions around the Christmas season, we may begin to see incremental positive change in our country’s culture.
This piece first appeared at TPUSA.
