Happy Holidays

Mikaela says:

A pastor in Raleigh, N.C. (Hi, Maggie!) has spearheaded a campaign to target stores who greet customers with "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas," threatening to take away their business. The church has taken out a full-page ad in the local newspaper urging Christians to boycott these stores.

This from the L.A. Times:

"Our position is, if they want the gold, frankincense and myrrh, they should acknowledge the birth of the child," said Wooden, pastor of the Upper Room Church of God in Christ.

Emboldened by their victories in November's elections, conservative Christians nationwide have converged around the topic of Christmas, contending that secularists and nonbelievers have tried to obliterate the holiday's religious meaning.

Conservative Americans feel ready to push back against what they deem "the secularists or the humanists or the elitists" who dominate popular culture, said the Rev. Mark Creech of the Christian Action League of North Carolina, which is based in Raleigh.

"It's a cultural war. We are in the thick of it,"Creech said. "It's not so much an attack on us. It's an attack on Christ."

Wooden and his church - which has a cherry-red "Merry Christmas" banner hanging across its front, looking for all the world like a political slogan - aim to push back against that spirit of caution.

The paper ran a series of passionate letters, many critical of the advertisement. An Episcopal priest wrote to compare the campaign to the Nazi policy requiring Jews to identify themselves with yellow stars.

Wooden, 43, considers the campaign such a success that he has set aside money in the church budget - full-page ads cost about $7,600 - to buy a similar advertisement next year. Fresh off the fierce debate over same-sex marriage, which he opposes, condemnation from the left does not trouble him. On the contrary, he said: "It seems to me the greater the persecution, the stronger the church."