Christmastime is NOT Here

I ignored the commercial that began running the first week of October. I ignored the gift baskets on the top shelf of CVS that appeared two weeks ago. But now that Halloween is over, every store has switched over to full-blow Christmas mode. It disgusts me. It just proves how secularized Christmas has become.

Christmastime consists of Advent and Christmastide. That's November 28-January 6 this year. Not November 4-December 24. By not observing this, stores just prove how little the religiousness of Christmas matters. They hijack the season to sell, sell, sell. Advent is about preparation and waiting and love, not about red and green discount sales. And the 12 days of Christmas apparently do not exist to stores since no one here buys gifts after Christmas Eve. Christmas Day is "Throw Out the Tree and Gift Wrap" Day instead of, you know, the birth of the Christ.

Christmastime is my favorite season, but I hate the secular aspect of it. Why can't we commercialize a secular holiday and leave Christmas alone? And I also don't act like Christmas is the most important Christian holiday, because it's not. It's just the beginning of the real reason to celebrate: Easter. Lent is left alone, and Easter has been commercialized too, but not as much, and I'm glad. Leave Easter to the people who value it, and leave Christmas alone too.

I'm not singing one carol til November 28.

[Photo is of the Christmas tree is the lobby of the university center of my state school, because, you know, Christmas isn't so religious that a public school should remain separate of it.]