The Times article continued:
"The lunch conversation inevitably turned to whether the White House would display its crèche, customarily placed in a prominent spot in the East Room. Ms. Rogers, this participant said, replied that the Obamas did not intend to put the manger scene on display — a remark that drew an audible gasp from the tight-knit social secretary sisterhood. (A White House official confirmed that there had been internal discussions about making Christmas more inclusive and whether to display the crèche.)"
In the next sentence we learn that this radical idea was eventually scotched. (Perhaps the "audible gasp" from the bipartisan audience tipped them off.) But the fact that it was going to happen reveals a level of political tone-deafness in the current administration that is staggering. To most average Americans -- who did not grow up in an Ivy-League, inside-the-Beltway hothouse governed by the rules of the French Revolution -- the idea of keeping Jesus out of "the people's house" at Christmas evokes disturbing images of the Holy Family being turned away from the Inn, or worse yet, images of Herod. But to a super-secular White House afraid to offend anyone -- except for average Americans -- it probably just seemed like another fab "progressive" innovation.
If President Obama wanted to fuel the fears of every serious Christian in America and actually prove that he is every bad thing they've ever heard about him on every crazy Web site, the idea of symbolically taking Jesus out of the White House at Christmas would be just the ticket!
This does not surprise me and it is an anomaly that the White House didn't go forward with the idea of nixing the manger scene. Is it amateurness or simply narcissism that fuels Obama's decisions because with regard to social decorum, he and the First Lady seem clueless.
Keeping Baby Jesus from the White House? Well, this clip from The Big Lebowski carries the message (and warning - NSFW and likely to offend some people with language, but grow up).
2 comments:
Being a non-Christian, my Christmas wish for Obama is a date with a rope and a 100 year old oak tree.
Make Christmas "more inclusive"? What does that mean??? It's a Christian holiday, celebrating Christ. What's next, making Hanukkah more inclusive? Should this red-headed Irish girl start lighting up the Kwanzaa candles? And how, pray tell, does doing away with the focal point of Christmas make it MORE inclusive??? Ah, Brave New World...
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