Our fair little town hosts a “Winterfest” parade that my husband and I went to a couple nights ago. We walked up and down the downtown area looking at all the decorated windows, but looked in vain for any mention of the Christ of Christmas. Slowly but surely, nativity scenes have been replaced with snowmen, the word Christmas has been replaced with “Winter,” and Christmas hymns have been replaced by “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.” The library still has a large crèche scene out front. I wonder how long before someone raises a stink about it. After a very nice fireworks display, the parade finally started. There must have been 30 or so floats, more than I expected. I was definitely feeling the cold in my fingers and toes by the time the last one rolled by. All the lights and colors and the excitement of children make it a very festive affair. There were lots of snowmen, a Grinch or two, a Star Wars themed float (complete with a live Wookie and an inflatable Baby Yoda) and three Santa Clauses. But the spirit of Christmas was a ghost at this parade with the exception of the men’s barbershop group that went by singing an actual Christmas hymn. Kudos, men! I definitely don’t want to see an inflatable baby Jesus floating around, but a manger scene or two would have been well received.
We went home and watched the 1999 version of “A Christmas Carol” with Patrick Stewart. There are a couple improvements I would make on it if I could (the Ghost of Christmas Future looks silly), but in general, this has been our favorite version. It’s not only faithful to the book, but also it creates an ambiance that honors the Biblical Christmas story, using Christmas hymns, a church visit on Christmas Day, and references to the One who made lame men walk. I used to read A Christmas Carol to our children in the evenings before Christmas. It only has five chapters, cleverly called “staves” by Mr. Dickens. For those of you who haven’t a musical background, staves is the plural of staff. It’s only right that book which purports to be a musical “carol,” is comprised of musical staves instead of chapters. It’s hard to find any sort of Christmas special that honors Christ, isn’t it? We usually watch the Charlie Brown Christmas special just to hear and see Linus reciting from Luke chapter 2.
What are your favorite Christmas specials?
I’ll probably delete this in the morning while admiring the Christmas tree.
Lynniebeemuseoday 
All the commercialism really gets to me. Think I would have been sad witnessing what you did at the Razzle Dazzle parade (or whatever it’s called). There was a year or 2 a few years ago when someone tried to get rid of the manger scene at the library. Thankfully it hasn’t happened….yet. It’s real easy to get sucked into the commercialism….I’m always trying to fight it.
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I figured somebody must have complained about that nativity scene. I’m glad it’s still there.
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