Re: Rating songs and singers

Date: 21 May 2003 06:53:13 -0700
Newsgroups: rec.music.rock-pop-r+b.1950s
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"Bill Bugge" <email-address-deleted> wrote in message news:<yVcya.7329$email-address-deleted>...
> Mark Dintenfass <email-address-deleted> wrote:
> >
> > Bill, I know this is a touchy issue, and I hesitate to go into it, but
> > I've known observant Jews for whom just hearing the name of Jesus
> > seemed somehow a violation of their own religion, or somehow
> > threatening.
>
>
> I'm glad you hesitate to go into it. I do too. I'd prefer to leave it to
> Bruce to comment, either here or by e-mail.
My comments (expanding on one I just made a few minutes ago):
It is perfectly acceptable to me for _Christians_ to celebrate
Christmas. I just wish they'd realize that, for the minority of us who
are _not_ Christmas, it is just as alien holiday as, say, some Islamic
holiday is to you. I sometimes wish that the whole last of December
would disappear from the calendar, because I do feel alienated. But
the point I made was that, as long as you use the name _Christmas_, it
_cannot_ be a secular holiday.
I remember a version of the song "Silver Bells" which, instead of the
lines:
Silver Bells, Silver Bells,
It's Christmas time in the city,
Ring-a-ling, hear them ring,
Soon it will be Christmas Day!
had:
Silver Bells, Silver Bells,
Holiday time in the city,
Ring-a-ling, hear them ring,
Soon it will be New Year's Day!
I do not recall how they handled the other references to Christmas in
the song, but when I heard that lyric, I loved it -- now _that_ is
making the song secular. I don't care _what_ you sing in church -- it
can be even as extremely religious as "Oh come, let us adore Him,
Christ the Lord" (my refusal to sing those words in the 7th grade
alienated me from my music teacher and turned a friendly relationship
into a hostile one!) but I don't like having people say that "White
Christmas" is secular, just because it doesn't go to _that_ extreme.
If it says "Christ"mas, it is _not_ secular!
Is that bigoted? Bruce