I used to enjoy the Holiday season. But some people just ruin it for me every year. I'm referring to Christians. Like those who have a fit when some place uses Season's Greetings or Happy Holidays. They seem to think that it's something new and sinister, but these phrases go back several decades. They're considerate and inclusive and people didn't used to complain, but Christians are more aggressive these days.

Now they're getting upset when a government official puts up a Holiday tree. They're out of line. Christians do not own the Yule Season, they stole it. Jesus wasn't even born on December 25 anyway. Who was? Every Mystery Cult god-man.

And nowhere in the Bible does it tell people to drag trees in their houses and decorate them. That's another thing they stole from paganism. In Rhode Island, founded as a haven for religious dissidents, Christians protested the Governor's Holiday tree by singing, "O Christmas Tree." They should have sung it in the original German, where it's "O Tannenbaum." That means "fir tree" - see what I mean?

I'd like to conclude by wishing everyone a Merry Xmas, just to see if anyone is linguistically ignorant enough to find that objectionable. (Otherwise it'd be Festive Yule.)

Sincerely,

Stephen Van Eck

Rushville, PA

When I woke up one morning, my head was buzzing, due to one outlandish dream. Days later, as I’m writing this, I am mentally breathless. In my dream, I was sitting next to Rush Limbaugh. It was during one of his “Excellence In Broadcasting” shticks.

And he had as his guest the current front runner in the Republican presidential sweepstakes. Well, here’s why I am, as I’m writing this, mentally breathless. I heard Rush pose Newt the following question:

“Would you want your grandchildren to assimilate the American work ethic by cleaning the wash rooms of the schools they attend?”

According to the lawyer, who handled my bankruptcy, there are families, who are living in their SUVs, their previous homes lost to foreclosure. Not too long ago, the relevant breadwinners were employed, and pulling down some very good money. I suppose one could describe them as “arriviste impoverished.” Yeah, I know a little French… of course, that turn of phrase could then be applied the children of same.

Those children would then fall into the category the aforementioned front-runner does have in mind for janitorial employment. It is easy to conjecture that their parents, the arriviste impoverished, would fail to be grateful, in the event Newt as the new American president effects the relevant national program.

And I conjecture that the grandparents of those children would likewise fail. What gets me is that large numbers of those grandparents are today literally praying for the current president’s being replaced by Newt.

Lem’me conclude with a wager I dearly wish I could offer. Ten thousand dollars ($10,000). That’s right. Ten thousand sacajewas says you’ll never hear, in waking life, Rush pose Newt that question.

Sincerely,

A Alexander Stella

Susquehanna, PA

All humans are created by God.

One human gladly accepts and thanks God for a soul and their existence. The other accepts their existence but denies God as the creator and thus refuses a soul.

The human that believes in God has a body that will die, but a soul that will live and be reunited with a body at the general judgment of the end time. The human that has a body, but refuses a soul will die and be in a denial of God’s greatest gift - a soul and a glorified body.

Are Mr. C. Hitchen and Mr. S. Hawking ready to defy God? Are all atheists in a belief that there is no God? Can an atheist go back in human knowledge of time (13.7 billion years ago) and start a universe out of nothing?

Only a supreme intellect far above has any understanding that humans could create any thing from nothing! Only God!

Of the 120 known elements of our earth (hydrogen, oxygen, potassium, etc.) a fully developed human has about 90 of the 120 elements. And now we have it - two piles or stacks of 90 elements! One that believes in God and one that doesn’t!

Believe in God and you will be joined in Heaven with Jesus. You may be crippled, you may be deaf or blind, or you may be 100 years old and deformed and ugly. Have faith!

The prime of human life is to be in your 30’s. You are not too young, you are not too old!

How old was Jesus when he died for everyone, believers and non believers? He was 33 years old.

It stands to reason - that a body and soul in everyone will be 33 years old in Heaven!

Jesus, the Son of God, who was born in a most humble way and who died in a most horrible way, wants all of us in Heaven! Keep the Commandments, go to confession if you commit a mortal sin and wish Jesus a holy Christmas on December 25.

Sincerely,

Bruce Moorhead

Susquehanna, PA

I was out enjoying the spirits of Christmas when I heard that our American Soldiers are coming home from Iraq. Oh happy day. I know one young man who finally will come home on leave for this Christmas, but I'm not sure if the military will change their plans of sending him to Afghanistan for the new year. I hope so. I lost a couple of my American soldier heroes this year. One served in WW2 and the other served in Vietnam. They still served after coming home in the old soldiers and sailors home, and never missed being part of the escort home for the ones who paid the ultimate price of freedom.

I grew up in a family of warriors. Everyone served whether it was by patriotic duty, or winning the draft lottery. My favorite aunt was a marine during WW2, and founded an all woman legion post in Elmira, NY. That post did not survive as there were so few women who served back then. Today it would be a different story.

I guess I say this as in American today, there is such a polarization of our country that does harken of the protests during the 1960's. I will never forget going to the bus depot with my Granddad, in his capacity of Legion commander, to welcome "the boys" back. There were protesters there. My Granddad was a mild tempered man by nature, so you can imagine my surprise at how loud his voice carried through that terminal, and the public shaming he gave everyone of them who would dare dishonor such honorable men as these. He was so inflamed with passion that the protesters put down the signs, and the ugly attitudes, and waited respectfully, as they watched him personally offer his thanks and a handshake to everyone of them and invited them to come for a cold beer at the legion. As these boys, and they were boys, filed off those buses, and into the arms of their families, I watched as the protesters cried, and shook their hand. I also watched the family members come over to my Granddad and tell him thank you. Needless to say, there were no more protests at the bus depot after that.

I hope this Christmas season will give everyone a chance to be a hero to another, or even just be the hero in your own life, and agree that even though we all have our differences, we all have much in common and in that spirit, try to come to a solution that leaves the chance for everyone to open up to new possibilities without the ego troubles that so often runs amuck. So to all the protesters, and the politicians, think back to your heroes, and do the right thing. We all benefit when even one person stands up to stop the craziness that happens when one forgets what the reason for the season is.

Sincerely,

Cynthia Allen

Summersville, PA

The Christmas story begins not with the birth of Jesus in Bethlehem but 4,000 years earlier in a land called Eden and not with Joseph and Mary but with Adam and Eve.

Here in Eden's heavenly garden the Earth's primal pair were free to do as they willed; only one restriction was imposed: “of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it: for in the day that you eat thereof you shall surely die” (Gen. 2:17).

But paradise did not suffice. They disobeyed. But this sin was a divinely determined act that set into motion God's plan for a Messiah and for the first Christmas.

Nevertheless, they were expelled from Eden and condemned to death. Yet God gave them hope in an enigmatic prophecy: “And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed” (Gen. 3:17).

The phrase, “her seed” is unique. The “seed” is always from a man, but here it is from a woman. All of mankind is born of the procreative seed of a man; how could seed come from a woman?

We wait until 740 B.C. for another prophecy to shed light on this question. “Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Emmanuel” (Isa. 7:14).

“Virgin” is better translated “damsel.” But surely there is nothing unusual about a young woman having a male child. There must be something distinctive about the birth of this Boy as there is about His name which means, “God with us.”

The prophet Daniel draws back the curtain farther and sheds more light on the coming of this Emmanuel. He foretells exactly when this promised Son would be born: “from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah, the Prince, shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks” (Dan. 9:25).

Historians tell us that the king of the Persian Empire, Artaxerxes, issued a decree to “restore and to build Jerusalem” in 457 B.C. The “seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks” total 483 days. Since a “day” can be a metaphor for a year (Ezk. 4:6) or for a thousand years (Gen. 2:17), the 483 days is equivalent to 483 years.

Subtracting 483 years from 457 B.C. takes us to 26 A.D., the very year the Messiah was baptized and began His public ministry.

Even the heavens heralded His birth. Picture, if you will, the night sky in Babylon. The year is 3 B.C. Several Magi, astronomers of that time, gaze awestruck at a starry spectacle.

The planets Jupiter and Venus rise in the eastern sky and come so close together that they appear as one bright and unusual star. To the magi, Jupiter signified kingship and Venus represented birth, hence, the birth of a king. Ten months later they observe the same celestial choreography but in the West. Somewhere a king, a most notable king, was about to be born.

There was more. In that same year, Jupiter appeared to merge with the star Regulus, the brightest star in the zodiacal sign of Leo, the constellation emblematic of rulership and Israel. This, also, occurred twice. Here the stars announce that this king would rule Israel.

The magi might have been Jewish scholars exiled to Babylon when Jerusalem was conquered by the Babylonians in 587 B.C. They would have been acquainted with the many Scriptural references pointing to a coming Messiah. The wise men were convinced that the messages in the stars proclaimed the birth of that great king, the Messiah.

But there is an apparently insurmountable obstacle to His birth. It was prophesied that the Messiah would come through the line of King Jechoniah. But he was cursed by God. No male issue from his line could ever sit upon David's throne. How, then, could this “impossible” Messianic prophecy be fulfilled?

Joseph, the stepfather of Jesus, is in this cursed royal line. But he, his sons, and all their descendents, are forever debarred from David's crown.

Yet because Jesus was begotten by a virgin birth - Mary's “seed” prophesied 4,000 ago - He escaped the curse of Jechoniah. Jesus - and only Jesus - is eligible to sit upon the throne of David. But first He must don a crown of thorns, later He will be coronated with a crown of gold.

Yet the prophecies and signs heralding the birth of the kingly Messiah are eclipsed by one yet grander drama. It is the story of Easter and the empty tomb. But that is another story.

Sincerely,

Bob Scroggins

New Milford, PA