Signs of the Times

with contributions from Kathleen Rose

A message in the Seattle Shopping News reprinted from the Seattle-King County Civil Defense Information
Bulletin Seattle, Washington

There is a better thing than the observance of Christmas Day, and that is keeping Christmas.

Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people, and to remember what other people have done for you; to ignore what the world owes you, and to think what you owe the world; to put your rights in the background and your duties in the middle distance, and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground; to see that your fellowmen are just as real as you are, and to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy;... to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe, and look around you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness—are you willing to do these things even for a day?

Then you can keep Christmas. ...Are you willing to believe that love is the strongest thing in the world—stronger than hate, stronger than evil, stronger than death—and that the blessed life which began in Bethlehem nineteen hundred years ago is the image and brightness of the Eternal Love?

Then you can keep Christmas.

And if you keep it for a day, why not always?

Kathleen Rose in Seventeen MagazineNew York, New York
[© 1967 by Triangle Publications, Inc.
Reprinted by permission.]

I don't believe in Santa Claus. Before you shrug your shoulders and say, "So?" let me add that not only don't I believe in the jolly old fellow, but I don't think children should be taught to believe in him either....

Although I agree with the motives of those who maintain the Santa Claus myth, I think it is senseless to submit children to it only to turn around one day and tell them you were merely joking. Wouldn't it give children just as much pleasure and be a lot simpler for everyone if we showed Christmas as it really is—a religious holiday and a joyous time—certainly the last time of year when we should resort to deception, however well-intentioned it may be.

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