The Purpose of Christmas
I was just walking through the store and saw a copy of "The Purpose of Christmas" by Pastor Rick Warren. I got swelled up with desire to respond to this book. It was easy pickins. I got home and headed straight to Amazon to purchase a used copy (there's no way I'd buy it new). If I hadn't had the positive fund raising efforts recently I wouldn't have bought it. I'm semi-considering becoming a flea of this book and writing a book response (not just an internet one). In fact any of the regulars here would find this book an easy shred. Seriously every sentence I saw deserved some form of response, even for nothing but to correct the semi-deceptive manner in which he builds his case to love Christmas because of Christ.
I forget most of what I briefly read in the store. I'm feeling the juices flowing and got awfully worked up as a result of wanting so bad to see a published response to this book. Considering my history with wars on Christmas I might be just the guy. By the way, The Blasphemy Challenge is coming up on a 3 year anniversary and near a million views.
Does anyone have a copy? You can check the preview out on Amazon.
UPDATE: The Purpose of Christmas response to Pastor Rick Warren
Please become a Patron of Brian Sapient
Support our activism efforts by making your Amazon purchases via this link.
- Sapient's blog
- Login to post comments
The purpose of Christmas is
The purpose of Christmas is presents, more presents, ugly sweaters, egg nog and the annual "A Christmas Story" marathon on TNT.
Free your mind.
Rick Warren. What a putz.
Rick Warren. What a putz. He's never had an original thing to say in his life. I can not explain his popularity even among the mouth-breathers of the religious right, never mind any that are capable of thought.
Asside: I have an annual tradition of annoying my more religious relatives (and amusing my less religious relatives) with seasonal greetings cards that state simple: "Axial tilt is the reason for the season!"
I say we should get back to
I say we should get back to the original meaning of celebration at this time of year, before Xianity subverted it - Saturnalia. From Wikipedia: "The celebrations included a school holiday, the making and giving of small presents (saturnalia et sigillaricia) and a special market (sigillaria)".
Or perhaps, for other cultures, the basic celebration of having passed the winter Solstice, with the Sun now having begun to return.
Of course, for people like me in the southern hemisphere, it doesn't quite work, but what the hell....
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
The ancestors of many of us
The ancestors of many of us have been celebrating the winter solstice for the last 5000 years or more, as one can tell from the astronomical alignments of certain ancient monuments, like the Newgrange monument in Ireland.
That one was built about 5200 years ago, about 2000 years before the first mention of Jesus Christ's ethnicity, in the Merneptah Stele.
The only people who knew how to write back then were Sumerians, in southeastern Iraq, and possibly also Egyptians. So one has to use archeology, like with Newgrange, for all the rest of humanity. It would be a bit of a long story to post here, but I've researched the "where was everybody" question elsewhere, and I could post on it in the forums here.
Brian, Warren needs a new
Brian, Warren needs a new one torn and you are just the person to do it.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Deadly Fingergun wrote:I can
That's just it. He makes people feel comfortable with their ignorance. So that ignorance is bliss.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
If anyone has purchased his
If anyone has purchased his book and would like to write a response, I am preparing to put together a small site aimed directly at him.
I just purchased: http://www.thepurposeofchristmas.net (he owns the .com) it will redirect to this thread for now. When I have read the book and can put together some dissections I will start loading content. However if you would like to write an article in response, I could use any help I can get. Thanks again to the recent donors that have allowed me the ability to not think twice when making these two purchases.
If you've written articles about Christmas in general, all of them would be great to have. Send them to me via the contact form or simply post them here.
Please become a Patron of Brian Sapient
Support our activism efforts by making your Amazon purchases via this link.