Have you noticed the volume of media attention Christmas Day has drawn? The controversy began in earnest last year, but the noise is so loud this season I think it's affecting us.I watch TV for my major input of news and, boy oh boy, has the discussion been interesting. For example, I've learned that the Christmas tree might be referred to as the "holiday tree."Even the greeting of "Merry Christmas" might be pronounced as "Merry X-mas." Or, more generically, "Happy Holiday." It's enough to make me crazy! I question these debates by well-known, highly educated, huge-salaried individuals which go on and on without anyone ever tumbling to the fact that an unemotional look at the undisputed historical truth underlying the matter knocks all their arguments right in the head. All this hoopla made me curious about the many world religions and their historical beginnings. And what about those with no religion? Do you know the difference between an agnostic and an atheist?If you are an agnostic, you profess an uncertainty or a healthy skepticism about the existence of God or a higher being.If you are an atheist, you do not believe in the existence of God or any other higher power. Ten years ago, Madalyn Murray O'Hair was the best-known atheist in America. I do not know who replaced her.Skepticism about the Christmas story is nothing new. In the 1790s, the famous political theorist, Thomas Paine, set off a flap when he wrote that the doctrine of the virgin birth was "blasphemously obscene."What is new, however, is the widespread effort to either publicly silence or sanitize the essentially religious message of Christianity.
Earlier this year, a large public outcry stopped the Seattle School District from closing down several elementary schools. Following this, Superintendent Raj Manhas appointed a committee to view all of the district's options to save money. Well, now the results are in.The independent committee just announced that one of the measures it recommends is closing certain schools. It is regrettable the district has arrived at this decision-where just to get out of debt, some schools must be shut down. As much as I don't want to see the district close schools, is there much choice left? Although every school is part of a community, if they are under-attended is there a need to keep them running?
Longtime neighborhood resident Margaret Morton used to walk her dog Sapphire to Magnolia Village an average of three times a week from her home in the 3800 block of 33rd Avenue West. But it will be a long time-if ever-before she makes the trek again.Morton, 56, was severely injured Nov. 13 when a chimney collapsed on her during a remodeling project at her home, leaving her with brain injuries, said her sister, Arnett Morton, who has been living in the same house.Margaret is currently in a Mercer Island nursing home, but her sister and next-door neighbor, Joanne Beyer, have been left trying to cope with the aftermath of the debilitating accident.Margaret's medical expenses have been covered by insurance from her job as a dental-assistant instructor and program coordinator at the Seattle Vocational Institute, Arnett said. But other expenses such as mortgage and car payments aren't, and Arnett said she has been unable to get access to her sister's bank account to pay those bills.
raham Lincoln, the Civil War, melancholy prostitutes, dead spouses, hiking, hangings and holy wars are only a few of the gifts folks can expect this holiday season - judging, that is, by what's selling at our neighborhood bookstores.Seeing that Seattle is a big book-buying city, it should be possible to take something of a spiritual and intellectual reading of our liberal, latte-sipping populace by finding out what sorts of literature we're gifting each other this holiday season."There's a lot of really hot books this year," said Georgiana Blomberg, owner of Magnolia's Bookstore in the Village. Historical fiction, historical biography and memoirs seem particularly popular right now, she said. Leading that list are such titles as "The March," by E.L. Doctorow, a fictionalized account of Gen. Sherman's "march to the sea," as well as Doris Kearns Goodwin's study of Lincoln, "Team of Rivals," and "The Year of Magical Thinking," writer Joan Didion's account of the recent sudden death of her husband, novelist John Gregory Dunne.
Lead-footed motorists are not paying attention to the 35-miles-per-hour speed limit on the western half of the Magnolia Bridge, according to Capt. Joe Kessler, commander of the Seattle Police Department's traffic section.Police aren't pleased with the trend and have written more than 150 speeding tickets in just the past couple of months, he said, adding that the cops are working the bridge only an hour or so at a time. Most tickets are for driving 45 to 60 m.p.h., Kessler said. "And we've also had a number of accidents in the area."One of those involved a speeding motorist failing to negotiate a recently installed right-turn lane to Thorndyke Avenue West off the bridge road, he said. "While they were investigating that accident, they had another one."
Whatever your special holiday, the holiday season can cause stress in young children. Children respond to stress in their own ways: crying, tantrums, clinging, excessive energy, temporary regression such as thumb sucking and many other manifestations. We can't eliminate all holiday stress, but we can teach healthy ways to deal with stressful situations.
Ideally, the holidays are a joyous and festive time spent with family and friends. For many older adults, however, this time of year brings reminders of change and loss and is anything but merry.During the holidays, some older adults reflect more on the absence of family and feel that traditional reunions or events are meaningless without those loved ones. Unrealistic expectations play a major role in holiday stressors as well. Late-life depression affects more than 6 million Americans, most of them women, but only 10 percent of people ever get treated, according to The Society for Women's Health Research.
Queen Anne Historical Society's Crown of Lights competition was held last week, and the results of the yearly competition are in. The winning light display in the "On the Boulevard" section was the doing of the Tom and Keri Lether family at 1240 Bigelow Ave. N. The Lethers have been decorating for the holidays 15 years now, adding something new to the display every year. It's a great way to meet their neighbors, the family has found; this year they even had a party for 85 of them to celebrate the display.
Disputes in many parts of the world erupt into war, but not in Czechoslovakia, at least not in Martina Jambrichova's lifetime. In fact, when the country separated into two, there was no dispute as far as Martina could tell - no prej-udice or clashing beliefs. "There was nothing to fight about," she says.In 1918, at the end of World War I, the closely related Czechs and Slovaks of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire merged to form Czechoslovakia. After World War II, the land fell within the Soviet sphere of influence and became a communist nation, along with many other Eastern European countries. Soviet authority finally collapsed in 1989, and Czechoslovakia regained its freedom through a peaceful "Velvet Revolution." On Jan. 1, 1993, the country separated, again peacefully, into the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
Preconceived notions about priests go out the window when you meet the Rev. Melissa Skelton, new rector at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Lower Queen Anne. Not only is she a priest, but she's also married to a priest, the Rev. Bob Gallagher, and she's also the mother of a 27-year-old son, Evan, who lives in Washington, D.C. Beyond that, the Rev. Skelton is well known in some circles as a corporate consultant; she's had her own busi-ness for a number of years, and she's used to accomplishing goals.Known affectionately to her parishioners as Mother Melissa, the svelte, silver-haired Skelton decided to study for the priesthood in the 1980s and, a little later, for an M.B.A. at the University of Chicago. While in school, she spent two summers as a clinical pastor. As she explained during a recent interview in her office - her soft, smooth voice showing just a hint of a Southern accent - in the Episcopal church such experience provides a way for people to examine whether they really want to be priests. Soon after graduation, the Cincinnati cleaning-products giant Proctor & Gamble recruited her. She ended up working for them for five years, simultaneously serving in a parish. It was during this time that she was ordained as a priest even though she was fully involved in the business world.
Yesterday, Thanksgiving. Today, Christmas! How did an entire month accelerate faster than it takes to ride the monorail, and why doesn't my husband think so? To him the month dragged by. How can two working people sharing one home experience the same bustling month so differently? Could it possibly be that Christmas, like most celebrations, comes at a woman's expense?
You might think that, as a card-carrying agnostic or possibly atheist, I would be cheering the movement to change the words "Merry Christmas" to "Happy Holidays," or some other innocuous phrase like "Happy Neutral Non-secular Celebration." But I'm not. I think it's a load of ... well, reindeer manure.The last time I checked, we live in the United States of America, a nation founded on the principles of freedom of speech, religion and actions within the law. When did we turn into a country that wants to control people's thoughts and words?By going to court to force businesses to cease using the words "Merry Christmas," and to remove such horrifying images as angels and wise men from their Chri- excuse me, holiday trees, in favor of fruits and vegetables, these secular bigots without a life are forcing our government to play a role in dictating religious thought and celebration. That's a violation of our Constitution, which states that the government shall make no laws regulating religion.As for our schools and public buildings, as long as it is the choice of the people therein, and not the policy of the institution, to have a Christmas Tree - or a lighted Menorah or any other religious artifact representing an important day or celebration - then it shouldn't be a problem. It is incumbent on the educational system to make it voluntary, and to open the building to celebrations of all religions, teaching our children tolerance and understanding.
The trouble with an information society, where blogs are considered the equal of real newspapers, and where "real-ity" television shows like "Mr." Trump's little fake circus are considered, well, reality, for God's sake, is that nothing is more im-portant than anything else.J-Lo's new movie grosses $23 million, and the latest hit from France grosses $8 million, so, ipso facto, J-Lo's movie is better....Well, that's the world we live in, and we Boomers, though we did a lot of damage, can't really be blamed for this particularly pathetic state of affairs.Talk to the Gen-Xers, or whatever those yos who came after us are called.I mean, we're in a world now where they can discount Darwin and 100 years of science because it doesn't feel right to some terrified Cro-Magnon who thinks quitting cocaine and finding his own Personal Savior is the equivalent of changing water into wine.
Connoisseurs of irony can delight in the fact that, in famously under-churched Seattle, plenty of apparently extraneous gifts are leaving the stores, scenes that have little to do with the true spirit of Christmas.But dedicated ironists might consider, in the spirit of the season, observing a ceasefire in the culture wars.Today is the winter solstice, the year's shortest day. Today the earth pivots toward the sun, and we begin the long march toward summer. On Sunday Christians will commemorate the birth of Jesus and the star of Bethlehem that declared the good news. On the same day the Jewish world will observe the first day of Hanukkah in memory of the menorah that burned for eight days on a day's worth of oil. All three occasions reflect the sacredness of light and humanity's longing, in the face of mystery, for meaning.To that end, we would do well to pause and look back to something that happened in 1914.
On Friday evening, Dec. 2, under bright lights and a huge tent, the Greater Queen Anne Chamber of Commerce held its first annual Roasty Toasty holiday event in the new park at Queen Anne Ave. N. and Roy St. - currently called Counterbalance Square as the public process moves forward to permanently name the park. The event was part of the 12th annual Holiday Magic sponsored by Queen Anne merchants.