If you don't go to Church we won't have a Christmans!

[Stone]

I believe that Christmas is about Christ not Santa Clause my "faimly" just informed me that they are not going to be attending church tonight so I said fine then we have no christmas and I am ready to take the tree down and not open presents....

 

Do you think I'm overreacting I'm going regardless but I am taking this extreamly personaly.

[Mr Spock]

Yes, you are overreacting horribly Stoneheather. Worship is THEIR decision, not yours-what gives you the right to throw a tantrum and spoil the holidays for those who don't share your decision to worship in a house of faith? If you want to go to Church, go-if they don't, respect that and allow them to stay at home. I myself will attend a christmas service if asked but ONLY for my grandmother and ONLY to make her happy. Don't force others to be miserable.

[Stone]

O.K I see what your saying, but I am still going to make my son go he's only 5. I don't think he should beable to make these decisions at 5. but everyones says there not going now he doesn't want to go. Either do my neices and nephews and my brother and I want to go to church. Most of them are under 16 but the 16 year old started this and now they are all boycotting it...

[brashgal]

Better to lead by example and attend church as you planned. Maybe they'll feel guilty and accompany you, maybe they won't - you just need to do what is best for you.

[brashgal]

...and yes, the 5 year old needs to go with you.

[Mr Spock]

Originally posted by Stone

O.K I see what your saying, but I am still going to make my son go he's only 5. I don't think he should beable to make these decisions at 5. but everyones says there not going now he doesn't want to go. Either do my neices and nephews and my brother and I want to go to church. Most of them are under 16 but the 16 year old started this and now they are all boycotting it...

 

Take your son with you, explain to him that you enjoy his company. The 16 year old and other teens can stay at home if they choose to do so-they're old enough now. But ruining the holidays because they don't want to go to church is childish at best.

[Saving Grace]

Originally posted by Stone

I believe that Christmas is about Christ not Santa Clause my "faimly" just informed me that they are not going to be attending church tonight so I said fine then we have no christmas and I am ready to take the tree down and not open presents....

 

Do you think I'm overreacting I'm going regardless but I am taking this extreamly personaly.

 

 

I think your overreacting..

 

If you think Christmas is about Christ and Not Santa then why if they don't go to church are you taking away their presents? They aren't related to each other so why does that matter.

 

Show them how important Christ is in their lives but don't force it, they will eventually realize how important it is. I also believe that there are to many C & Er's in this world {People who only go to church when it's Christmas and Easter} I am one of them, but I was also raised Cathloic and went to private school, I had it forced down my throught. But I still honor him every chance I get. Every penny I put in the Salvation Army bucket, and teach my daughter to do the same, everytime I donate my services, time and money to any organization, etc. I pray to him when I need his help and sometimes when I don't to thank him for all the wonderful things I am so fortunate to have.....

 

If you truly believe in Christ then you need not a place to worship and pray to him. He is everywhere and we can honor him by his beliefs and giving of ourselves, not by taking away, how Christian is that?

[tiki]

Stone, did you survive your meltdown? Did anyone go to church?!

[Moose]

Stone,

 

I started a few years back reading the story of Jesus' birth. Noone is allowed to open anything until that story is read. This way, the meaning of Christmas is shared with all members of the family before the secular gift giving is carried on.

 

You might try that next year.

[tiki]

Moose I love that! What exactly are you reading it from?

[Stone]

My son, my brother my b/f, and I went to church. My brothers kids stayed home and wern't aloud to go to the parade. Church was short this year so after we went to the parade without them...

[Stone]

I will try that next year moose, and maby on Easter Sunday as well

[Moose]

Originally posted by tiki

Moose I love that! What exactly are you reading it from?

 

I read the story directly from the Scriptures.

 

Usually an NIV version so it's clearer to the younger kids.

 

Stone, you gave me a great idea! There's a hillside near here that has a TON of Easter lillies every year.......I may take the kids and explain to them how they come back each year and tie it in with Jesus' resurrection, and of course read the accounts of the event from the Bible.......thanks girl!

[dyermaker]

That really sounds like a great idea--the lillies thing.

 

Also, although I concede the commercialism is pretty outrageous (although not neccesarily malevolent, I think it's pretty organic) the gift-giving isn't neccesarily secular. Perhaps you could tie in the giving of gifts that you're sharing in with the gifts of the three kings to the christ child?

 

I think when you add that flavor to the occaision, you're making an effort to share your faith, whereas when you force them to go to church, you're simply trying to extort them.

[Moose]

I don't want to turn this into a debate with you Dyer, but this kinda ties into something we discussed in another thread. The gifts that you're referring to, I don't consider those to be symbolic of the gifts we give at Christmas.

 

The true gift is Christ Himself.

 

Also, from what I read, the men weren't Kings, they were wise men. And there were three catagories of gifts, not just three men. There could've been several, many more. And, they were sent by Herod, ( who some believe isn't possible ), they found Him as a young child, maybe 2 or 3 years old, then went back into their city or village through a different route to avoid Herod. Herod found out and sent men out to kill all males 2 and under......which is why I believe Herod was alive and ruling when Christ was born.

 

I think when you add that flavor to the occaision, you're making an effort to share your faith, whereas when you force them to go to church, you're simply trying to extort them.

 

Adding flavor is ok as long as you aren't disstorting the message.

 

Look, my kids have been going to Church since birth. Each one has their own ideas and feelings about what is taught and said at Church, and they each hold their own point of views.

 

NOT Once.....have I or Mrs. Moose cornered any of our kids and told them flat out, you believe or go to hell. Never.....and I can't imagine any other parent who is a true Christian doing that to their children. I'm sure there are some, but I would have to think that the majority don't.

 

You may see it as brain washing our children, when in fact, local and federal laws prevents us parents from going to Church while leaving our children at home. If we go, they go. Our teenagers have the option of staying home, going to a friends or going to Church. Most of the time, they choose Church....their choice.

[dyermaker]

Originally posted by Moose

I don't want to turn this into a debate with you Dyer, but this kinda ties into something we discussed in another thread. The gifts that you're referring to, I don't consider those to be symbolic of the gifts we give at Christmas.

Right--I was simply saying that Stone, or anyone, could tie the gifts into the gifts given to Jesus at his birth.

The true gift is Christ Himself.

Christ was an infant at his birth, and hadn't offered himself to anyone. Remember that he chose to offer himself, it was not a condemnation.

Also, from what I read, the men weren't Kings, they were wise men. And there were three catagories of gifts, not just three men. There could've been several, many more. And, they were sent by Herod, ( who some believe isn't possible ), they found Him as a young child, maybe 2 or 3 years old, then went back into their city or village through a different route to avoid Herod. Herod found out and sent men out to kill all males 2 and under......which is why I believe Herod was alive and ruling when Christ was born.

You could tell the story however you'd like--it's not like anyone who wrote about it in the Bible was there. Moose, the infancy narratives are a work of fiction. They were told as stories to illustrate the awesome power of Christ. The likelihood of there being a census that required all people to go back to their towns they were born in is slim to zero--censuses (censii?) were for tax purposes, and you would want people to be close to the land they owned, not the land they were born in.

Adding flavor is ok as long as you aren't disstorting the message.

I don't think any of the specifics you mentioned above "distort" the message of Jesus' birth. We're not designing a theology curriculum for her, we're looking for a way to christianize something that her family has secularized. Telling short, meaningful, and probably untrue stories will do the trick quite nicely.

NOT Once.....have I or Mrs. Moose cornered any of our kids and told them flat out, you believe or go to hell.

I should hope not. What's that got to do with anything? I'm not saying you're brainwashing your children at all---Parents have every right (and almost a responsibility) to pass on their religious beliefs to their children. I do not think a 5 year old should be making his own choices about whether to join their parents at church, or the dinner table, or anywhere.

 

In my tradition, we have a sacrament called Confirmation, which a child chooses to recieve (the choice cannot be made for them, unlike baptism)--after a child is confirmed, they are capable of making the choice to go to Church.

 

Anyway, back to my point--The truth of the stories is irrelevant. You'd have to do a lot of cutting if you were to strip the Bible down to stories that were historically accurate. The point is that 2,000 years ago (give or take, right Moose? ) kings/sages/wisemen/whatever gave some gifts to Jesus, and now we're here around a Tree giving gifts to each other.

[Moose]

Right--I was simply saying that Stone, or anyone, could tie the gifts into the gifts given to Jesus at his birth.

 

You're saying to tie in the gifts that we give to each other, correct? That's what I gathered anyway. The gifts that we give to each other is what secular society contributed to the occasion, at least, that what I think.

 

The gift that we all should equate Christmas with is the gift that God sent to us, His Son, who paid our sin debt and allowed us to once again be clean enough to be in His presence. There are no gifts.......measurable to that gift.

 

Christ was an infant at his birth, and hadn't offered himself to anyone. Remember that he chose to offer himself, it was not a condemnation.

 

Remember, that God is omnipotent, omnipresent, there is no past, present, future.....there is only the whole picture. In that whole picture, there has to be a Saviour to make it the maserpiece that it is......that Saviour is Jesus.....that Saviour is man's only way to God, the only way to Peace.

 

The likelihood of there being a census that required all people to go back to their towns they were born in is slim to zero--censuses (censii?) were for tax purposes, and you would want people to be close to the land they owned, not the land they were born in.

 

I'm almost sure that Joseph had land left to him from his father and maybe even his grandfather at that point....who knows......had I been him, I wouldn't of left anything unclaimed.

 

Telling short, meaningful, and probably untrue stories will do the trick quite nicely.

 

This is your recipe to introduce Christ into these children's minds at Christmas?

 

As for the rest of your post, I can only respond in kind to remind you that the gifts people exchange are not even close to being the gift God gave man when He sent Jesus here to pay for our sins. The gift is Jesus, not myrth, frankinsence or gold........

 

you can't gather around a tree and pass a gift like that around.

[dyermaker]

Moose, once again, she's trying to inject a little religious romanticism into a secular holiday, without forcing them to go to Church. I think tying in the gift-giving of the three kings with the gift-giving of her family is a nice way to do it, whereas going into a discussion about the lamb of god and blood debts for sin and all that jazz is somewhat creepy.