“Two very special words”

It seems like the holiday season starts earlier every year. Better start working on your wish list, because it's already here. No, Walmart hasn't quite rolled out its trees and Christmas decorations, and the Christian radio station hasn't switched to classical winter music yet. Those moves won't happen for at least a few more weeks. But even as an August heat wave ravages much of the country, the annual Christmas war has already begun.

“She wants to get rid of two very special words,” former President Donald Trump claimed of Vice President Kamala Harris during his rally on Saturday (Aug. 3) in Atlanta, Georgia. “She's crazy. She wants to get rid of those two very special words. Remember? I mentioned that over and over in 2016. By the way, we did much better in 2020 than we did in 2016. … We got millions more votes, as you know. You know that too. But we're not going to let that happen again. Ready? The two words are 'Merry Christmas.' She doesn't want anybody to say 'Merry Christmas.'”

Former President Donald Trump arrives as smoke machines go off to speak at a campaign rally in Atlanta, Georgia, on August 3, 2024. (John Bazemore/Associated Press)

As Trump noted, he had previously argued that President Barack Obama had done away with “Merry Christmas” and thus promised to reinstate the phrase if elected. Claims of a so-called “war on Christmas” were not new, but Trump has amplified the culture war theme. And lo and behold, just weeks after Trump was elected in 2016, everyone started saying “Merry Christmas.” Oh, wait, that's because the election is in November, after stores have already started stocking the Christmas departments (which is clearly a war on Thanksgiving).

Although Trump claimed his predecessor was a cheapskate, Obama had wished people “Merry Christmas” every year in social media posts and speeches. As NPR noted in 2017 after showing that Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton had all wished people “Merry Christmas” during their presidencies, “the reality, as far as we can tell, is that 'Merry Christmas' never left the White House.” But that didn't stop the Grinch from complaining every year. Trump even spent his first Christmas Eve as president tweeting that he had saved Christmas by stopping “the assault on our cherished and beautiful phrase” so people would say it again. So while the kids were setting out milk and cookies for Santa, ~~their parents~~ Santa Claus complained that people didn't think enough of him as the savior of Christmas.

In 2020, Trump returned to the “war on Christmas” rhetoric. And now he's already adding the attack to his speeches against Harris, like a Santa Claus who shows up every election night and delivers a stocking full of lies. There's just one problem. And if you've been paying attention, you already know who's naughty and who's good in this story without even looking at your list. Yes, Harris actually wishes people “Merry Christmas.” Not yet, of course, because it's August. She's not a monster. But the Baptist vice president wishes people “Merry Christmas” at the seasonally appropriate time. This “godless” liberal has tweeted “Merry Christmas” literally every year she's been vice president or U.S. senator (and before that).

As Trump has shown with his remarks on the 2020 election, he is not distracted by facts, so we can expect him to continue to use the Christmas argument in his campaign speeches. On Monday, he even shared a video clip to suggest that Harris was against people saying “Merry Christmas.” This question of A public witness grabs some tinsel and lights to debunk the “war on Christmas” rhetoric and take the problematic attacks to task.

The claims of a “war on Christmas” really gained momentum in 2005. Fox News host John Gibson wrote a book on the subject, The War on Christmas: Why the Liberal Plot to Ban the Holy Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought. His Fox News colleagues Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity also took a hard line on the subject on their shows. The main argument was that some stores were wishing people “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” while celebrating the festival of Mammon. The whole thing was absurd and fueled by angry people looking for something to shout about.

Bow-tie-clad commentator Tucker Carlson, then at MSNBC (after being fired from CNN, but then dropped from MSNBC and then hired and fired from Fox News), chimed in, thinking the argument was good: “I think it's kind of encouraging for Christians to see this, all this outrage, all this fear at Christmas time, you know, Christmas tree, Christmas carol, 'Silent Night' … because it means that Christianity is not dead. It still has the ability to scare people. It still gives people the creeps.” Is 'tis the season to give people the creeps? Aside from Santa Claus in the malls, the joy of a spooky Christmas feels a bit like we've been transported to an episode of Twilight Zone – The Hidden World.

It wasn't just TV pundits. Some conservative pastors also joined the fray, joining in as soon as it officially began in 2005. A megachurch in Florida quickly put up a large banner that same year to oppose the so-called “war on Christmas.”

To HELL with the word holiday; put CHRIST back in “Christmas”!

Nothing says “bring your kids to our Christmas play” like a banner with curses on it. The co-pastors of this hellfire-and-mistletoe megachurch in Florida were Randy and Paula White. They later divorced and she, now known as Paula White-Cain, is Trump's chief spiritual advisor, assuring us that God ordained Trump to win and save America.

Randy defended the controversial banner at the time, saying, “Christianity and some of our Christian values are under attack.” Obviously, “Happy Holidays” is an attack on Christianity. I didn't realize what a godless communist Bing Crosby was when he sang “Happy Holiday” (and we should definitely boycott that infernal hotel chain). Of course, if White had bothered to research the etymology of the word “holiday,” he would have found that it means “holy day.” So when someone says “Happy Holidays,” they really mean “Happy Holy Days.” What a horrible, secular statement! Perhaps before condemning a word to hell (to have it conjugated and diagramed forever), White should at least study its meaning.

Over the next few years, the “war on Christmas” became a staple of the season, along with nativity plays in church, cranberry sauce for dinner, and television marathons with a Christmas Story (You'll shoot your eye out.) But a decade later, it began to fizzle out a bit. Some conservative pundits and pastors still dreamed of stirring up a Christmas conflict, but it wasn't like the ones we knew. Then Trump rode down the escalator. Soon, the “war on Christmas” was back in full force.

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Trump's rhetoric of saying “Merry Christmas” again has always been odd. Not only was it wrong toward Obama, but it also implied that someone could not become president if they did not say those two words. This Christian nationalist idea brings us closer to religious criteria for office that the U.S. Constitution explicitly prohibits.

All this “war on Christmas” rhetoric also misses the point of the holiday season. Turning Christmas into some kind of culture war flashpoint doesn't really help Christianity. Like so much of Christian nationalism, this push is divisive and can encourage false, performative representations of Christianity that are divorced from the teachings of Jesus. Trump's missing the point is now evident in the way he is doubling down on his Christmas-themed attacks on Harris.

On Monday, Trump released a video clip of Harris from 2017 criticizing people for saying “Merry Christmas.” He captioned the video “SO AWFUL!” The clip was taken from resurfaced comments posted on conservative media sites (such as Fox News and the New York Post). The remarks were made in December 2017, after then-President Trump announced he would end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which protected some illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as minors from deportation. As Congress failed to reach an agreement to replace DACA, then-Senator Harris criticized her colleagues for celebrating Christmas while ignoring the people protected by DACA.

“This is morally wrong. And if we all sing happy songs and sing 'Merry Christmas' and wish each other 'Merry Christmas,' those children are not going to have a merry Christmas,” she explained. “How dare we say 'Merry Christmas'? How dare we? They are not going to have a merry Christmas. They don't know if they're going to be here days, weeks and months from now.”

Harris wasn't saying people shouldn't celebrate Christmas. She was simply criticizing the moral hypocrisy of those who say those two words but do nothing to help people who are at risk of deportation – and may even be deported during the holidays.

One can disagree with her political stance and oppose her for president, but to say Harris is against Christmas is to deliberately take her words out of context. Interestingly, her argument goes to the heart of the problem with the efforts of TV pundits and the former president to “condemn” Christmas. What really matters about Christmas is not saying it, but living it.

Therefore, every year at Word&Waywe send a seasonal newsletter, Disturbing Advent. We're tired of domesticated versions of the Christmas story. So each year we invite about 20 authors to join us in reflecting on the year's troubling news and the echoes in the first Advent. We've reflected on things like Advent in a Time of Uprising (2021), a Time of Refugees (2022), and a Time of Bloodshed in Israel (2023). We've also tackled issues like racism, violence, political uncertainty, and more in our award-winning devotionals. We'll be back this year with another round of daily devotions (starting December 1, but you can get in the Christmas spirit today and sign up for free).

As we've learned from the disturbing devotional writing of writers across the country and the world, Christmas isn't about yelling at people to say two words. It's about hope coming into the world. It's about two very special words: good news.

As a public witness

Brian Kaylor