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Our brothers and sisters in Muslim countries can't celebrate Christmas-or any aspect of their faith-openly for fear of persecution and death. And yet we, with all our freedoms, often choose to make Christmas a celebration of commercialism!
Christmas is a season which almost all Christians observe in one way or another. Some keep it as a religious season. Some keep it as a holiday. But all over the world, wherever there are Christians, in one way or another Christmas is kept.
There is no better time than now, this very Christmas season, for all of us to rededicate ourselves to the principles taught by Jesus the Christ. It is the time to love the Lord, our God, with all our heart - and our neighbors as ourselves.
If you pray enough for things, I am proof that they can happen. I feel like a kid on Christmas day now, every day. It's something I have wanted for a long time and I am as happy as anyone to be here. It is great to be back at my first love.
Like my best friend, I asked for drums for Christmas, and got them. But when he moved on to guitar, I realized two things: (1) guitar is a much more expressive instrument, (2) way more girls pay attention to guitar players than to drummers.
Christmas is not in tinsel and lights and outward show. The secret lies in an inner glow. It's lighting a fire inside the heart. Good will and joy a vital part. It's higher thought and a greater plan. It's glorious dream in the soul of man.
I'm a strong nonbeliever in the Christmas letter where you don't really read it because it's just full of kind of meaningless information. It doesn't really resonate to the person reading it, but it means so much to the person that wrote it.
When I first started shooting 'Sharpe,' back in the early 1990s, I'd kiss my two elder daughters goodbye at the end of August - Evie wasn't even born then - and I wouldn't see them again until Christmas. That was tough. They were hard times.
Fail not to call to mind, in the course of the twenty-fifth of this month, that the Divinest Heart that ever walked the earth was born on that day; and then smile and enjoy yourselves for the rest of it; for mirth is also of Heaven's making.
Time always seems long to the child who is waiting - for Christmas, for next summer, for becoming a grownup: long also when he surrenders his whole soul to time and I am as happy as anyone to be here. It is great to be back at my first love.
I just travel all the time. And I was just looking at the schedules now and starting the first week of October I will be every weekend with somebody at tournaments through Christmas. So it gets very difficult to just go away and not do that.
I was a little punk rocker and was pregnant with Sarah when I went to university. I had her in the Christmas holidays of the first term. It was 1979, and UCL was very proud of its reputation as a liberal university, so they were very helpful.
There's a new holiday tradition in my life, and it comes with an open door policy. Starting at 11 a.m. on Christmas Day, friends, family, whoever, is welcome to swing on through my place - I'll be cooking and drinking from morning till night.
In fact, I was one of the few trusted people that Lucy allowed to play with their kids. I spent time at their summer home, rode horses at their ranch, and swam at their beach house. I even spent a Christmas with them at Palm Springs one year.
My dad was fairly well-off, so I was raised in a very comfortable environment: the very nice suburbs of Paris. It was a very idyllic life. I also spent nearly all my summers in Britain, and Christmas, too, because my grandparents lived there.
Seeing the actual 'The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe', I absolutely loved it. It became one of my favourite films. It was a real Christmas classic, and it was one of the most popular films ever in British history.
Most Americans acquire dogs impulsively and for dubious reasons: as a Christmas gift for the kids. Because they saw one in a movie. To match the new living-room furniture. Because they moved to the suburbs and see a dog as part of the package.
My worst Christmas ever was in 1987 when Santa brought me and my sister a dose of chicken-pox. And my worst present ever was a Dirt Devil vacuum cleaner! I don't like to sound ungrateful, but I do find vacuuming difficult to get excited about.
I'm a physicist, and we have something called Moore's Law, which says computer power doubles every 18 months. So every Christmas, we more or less assume that our toys and appliances are more or less twice as powerful as the previous Christmas.
As I wrote 'The Christmas Lamp' I realized that tradition is priceless, whether you have a small family, a large family, or no family. Tradition doesn't have to be logical; it only has to emphasize the light of Christ and his everlasting love.
I once did a gig at an office Christmas party in the showroom floor of a friend's father's home appliance shop in the suburbs of Melbourne. It was to a much older crowd. Without a microphone. Or a stage. With the queue for the buffet behind me.
I think it's kind of difficult to write a good Christmas song because you have a narrow framework of references that you have to work within, and at the same time you want to do something that's personally original and hopefully somewhat unique.
Best of all, Christmas means a spirit of love, a time when the love of God and the love of our fellow men should prevail over all hatred and bitterness, a time when our thoughts and deeds and the spirit of our lives manifest the presence of God.
The dance, like most dances after supper, was a merry one; some of the older folks joined in it, and the squire himself figured down several couple with a partner, with whom he affirmed he had danced at every Christmas for nearly half a century.
My mother was a professional sick person; she took a lot of pain pills. There are many people like that. It's just how they are used to getting attention. I always remember she's the daughter of alcoholics who'd leave her alone at Christmas time.
Christ is still in Christmas, and for one brief season the secular world broadcasts the message of Christ over every radio station and television channel in the land. Never does the church get as much free air time as during the Christmas season.
I can't tell you how scary it can be walking onto a movie and suddenly joining this family, it's like going to somebody else's Christmas dinner, everyone knows everyone, and you're there and you're not quite sure what you're supposed to be doing.
Faith is salted and peppered through everything at Christmas. And I love at least one night by the Christmas tree to sing and feel the quiet holiness of that time that's set apart to celebrate love, friendship, and God's gift of the Christ child.
Like the Earth, the Web is a less appealing place than it used to be. If I want attitude and arguing and meanness and profanity and wrong information screamed at me as gospel, I'll get in a time machine and spend Christmas with my family in 1977.
Besides Christianity and specifically Catholicism being wonderful, Christmas is intrinsic to American culture and worth defending. Think of what happens at Christmas time. People play Mariah Carey Christmas songs... What else do you need in life?
Whatever he does should be seen as working at the Presidency and if he goes to Colorado for Christmas, it should be for a minimum amount of time, the family tradition and family get-together aspect emphasized, and it be seen as a working vacation.
Christmas and the New Year are actually two holidays, so there is a plural, which in the English language necessitates the use of the letter "S." Now, I suppose you could say "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year" but you probably have sh*t to do.
Each day of the holidays comes bringing its own gifts. Open your heart, Untie the ribbons, and enjoy the contents! Were earth a thousand times as fair Beset with gold and jewels rare She yet were far too poor to be A narrow cradle, Lord, for Thee.
December used to be very difficult for me. For many years, I fought the transition to the new year, was generally exhausted at the end of the year, and just wanted to hide. I described myself as a 'cranky Jewish kid who felt left out by Christmas.'
It's always a wonderful time to be able to settle down by the fire, enjoy the Christmas tree and the decorations, and just spend time with the ones you love and surround yourself with the people that you don't get to see enough throughout the year.
Christmas can be celebrated in the school room with pine trees, tinsel and reindeers, but there must be no mention of the man whose birthday is being celebrated. One wonders how a teacher would answer if a student asked why it was called Christmas.
Some of my favorite records growing up were Christmas albums. The ones I liked best were the albums that you could listen to from start to finish. You could put them on while you're decorating the tree or driving around looking at Christmas lights.
When you travel on Christmas, for you as the traveler - whether you're in 1A or 39D - there is a mental state that you have to put yourself in: that you're traveling at the busiest time of the year, and you're going to take whatever comes your way.
I'm not a fan of musicals at all, but I do think 'The Nightmare Before Christmas' is a very good. I always thought 'Walk the Line' was very good, too. I was in 'Nowhere Boy.' I played Paul McCartney. That was kind of musical - we did songs in that.
It always depresses me when people moan about how commercial Christmas is. I love everything about it. The tradition of having this great big feast, slap bang in the middle of winter, is an essential thing to look forward to at the end of the year.
My urge at Christmas time or Hanukkah-time or Kwanzaa-time is that people go to bookstores: that they walk around bookstores and look at the shelves. Go to look for authors that they've loved in the past and see what else those authors have written.
My grandmother adopted me for a while, and I was bouncing around a bit. I was always helped by the PTA and church groups with food and Christmas presents. It's a hard cycle to break, because when you don't have the resources, it's almost impossible.
Christmas is a season of such infinite labour, as well as expense in the shopping and present-making line, that almost every woman I know is good for nothing in purse and person for a month afterwards, done up physically, and broken down financially.
Me and my girlfriend don't have any family in Ipswich, so we were thinking of what we could do to fill our time on Christmas Day. We thought about feeding the homeless and we phoned up the church that we eventually went to and asked if we could help.
When I was eight years old, I got a dummy for Christmas and started teaching myself. I got books and records and sat in front of the bathroom mirror, practising. I did my first show in the third grade and just kept going; there was no reason to quit.
We have a host of English teachers in the family. My mum is an English teacher, and so are my dad, my aunt and my uncle. I have grown up with family writing competitions, and I can't remember a birthday or Christmas present that didn't include books.
Oh look, yet another Christmas TV special! How touching to have the meaning of Christmas brought to us by cola, fast food, and beer... Who'd have ever guessed that product consumption, popular entertainment, and spirituality would mix so harmoniously?
For me, the two weeks between Christmas and Twelfth Night have come to be reserved for desultory reading. The pressure of the holiday is over, the weather outside is frightful, there are lots of leftovers to munch on, vacation hours are being used up.
Whatever else be lost among the years, Let us keep Christmas still a shining thing: Whatever doubts assail us, or what fears, Let us hold close one day, remembering Its poignant meaning for the hearts of men. Let us get back our childlike faith again.
We tend to focus our attention at Christmas on the infancy of Christ. The greater truth of the holiday is His deity. More astonishing than a baby in the manger is the truth that this promised baby is the omnipotent Creator of the heavens and the earth!