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Say, do or think what you want, change names, traditions, the law, ban the symbols, even steal the baby, but He's not going away. Recently I received a jolt while reading coverage of Monroe's wonderful Holiday Parade. Probably shouldn't have as it was just another harbinger for this point in America's existence. I don't even know if "jolt" is the proper word; let's just say I felt the water around this frog getting warmer. Years ago I served on the Chamber of Commerce's Holiday Parade Committee. We had some great ones, highlighted by the year we featured the famous Philadelphia Mummers. An idea I brought to the table was to create a "Christmas Kid of the Year" contest where local children would write to tell us why they - or someone they nominated - wanted the honor of riding in the parade with Santa. Good friend and fellow committee member Dr. Lee Randall and I pored over entries, laughing, sometimes crying from the words of these little ones; it was a highly successful addition to the parade that is still in place today. Except, of course, for the harbinger. The "jolt" I had received was from reading that - like the original "Christmas" Parade - the feature had fallen to the forces of political correctness and was now the "Holiday" Kid of the Year. I have no idea when the name changed, but I know it's just the water heating up. Years ago a TV commercial featured a hippie mowing grass around his VW bus home. He stops the mower and says, "Ah, the '60's, a time of agonizing reappraisal!" On the doorstep of 2005, that's exactly where America is today. Who are we? What do we believe? Will we ever again believe collectively? I thought so, patriotically, after 9-11, but in the three short years since we have dramatically divided, if not splintered. Agonizing reappraisal in my life included everything. I was raised in a Christian home and taught that Jesus was the Son of God. The Vietnam War introduced me to extreme opposites to my world, politically, economically, ethnically, spiritually, geographically, philosophically. It also introduced me to drugs and alcohol that did extreme makeovers on my thinking and allowed me to step out of reality for the duration of their influence. Later, personal gifts of talent and character parlayed somewhat successful careers in music and management, making me money but little headway in my quest to find my place in this world. And, as I've shared previously, just before giving it all away I called to The One - whose name we now labor to remove from our society - to save me and give my life some purpose; He did! Agonizing reappraisal took me back to my starting point and I found my place in my equation of the hippie's bus … the temporary home of planet Earth. Last week someone stole the baby Jesus bolted to the floor of my church's Nativity Scene; another attempt to take Him out of Christmas. Whoever took him, we'd like him back, but it's obvious you need Him more than we do. They tried getting rid of Him 2,004 years ago but it didn't work then either. So, call it what you will because it won't change the fact that Christmas is simply about the birth of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. But what do I know?
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