The December Dilemma - December 2004

The winter holidays bring out the best in some people. It also brings out the differences.

For those who are not Christian, the differences become amplified because Christmas is a major holiday for Christianity and Capitalism, two prevalent religions in the U.S.

I’m Jewish, so I grew up celebrating Chanukah at this time of year. I was taught at home to be proud of my heritage, but at school, we sang “Christ our Savior is born”. This was in the 1970s, before discrimination lawsuits ran rampant.

I have to admit I love the Christmas season. Homes and stores are filled with the aromas of cinnamon and evergreen. Multicolored lights twinkle and tinsel shimmers. In parts of the country where it snows, they revel in seeing the first snowflake. Here, we hail the arrival of Gingerbread Lattes at Starbucks.

While none of the things I mentioned in that last paragraph have any religious significance, they are symbols associated with Christmas, and there’s a little voice inside me that says, “What about Chanukah?”

Chanukah isn’t a major holiday in the religious context. It commemorates the rededication of the temple in only eight days with the aid of a single drop of lamp oil after the temple’s desecration. It’s a story worth retelling because it is another example of the Jews’ perseverance to triumph over persecution. Chanukah’s popularity grew in the 20 th century only because of its proximity to Christmas. As the site Judaism 101 (http://www.jewfaq.org/holiday7.htm) notes, “It is bitterly ironic that this holiday, which has its roots in a revolution against assimilation and the suppression of Jewish religion, has become the most assimilated, secular holiday on our calendar.”

My husband is not Jewish, and while he’s not religious, he loves Christmas and I get caught up in his childlike excitement over the holiday. When we celebrated our first Christmas together, I wanted to get our tree the day after Thanksgiving. Our poor tree was dried out by Christmas. Incidentally, for Chanukah that year, he bought me our family menorah.

We now have a child, and according to Jewish decree, because Sara is my daughter, she is Jewish. Even if she grows up and joins a cult where they worship socks, she always will be Jewish.

I don’t want Sara to grow up feeling that Christian holidays are better than Jewish ones. I want her to be proud of her heritage and its traditions and pass them on to her children.

We will have a Christmas tree, but we’ll also have a menorah, play dreidel and eat latkes because that’s part of our Jewish culture.

A few years ago, I received some beautiful tree ornaments from my mother-in-law in the shapes of a dreidel and menorah. A few of my Jewish friends felt that was insulting because Christmas and Chanukah are separate holidays and one should have nothing to do with the other. While I generally agree with that sentiment, I proudly hang them on our tree each year because the ornaments were given out of love.

And that’s what the season is all about for me.