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And they shall name him Emmanuel: Sunday reflection

This morning’s Gospel reading is Matthew 1:18–25:

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about. When his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found with child through the Holy Spirit. Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly. Such was his intention when, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home. For it is through the Holy Spirit that this child has been conceived in her. She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means “God is with us.” When Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home. He had no relations with her until she bore a son, and he named him Jesus.

A happy Christmas Eve to all our readers. We hope you are preparing your celebrations with family and friends, enjoying the zenith of Advent just as our season of longing and anticipation climaxes with the Christmas celebration.

Family celebrations are often like that, and not just at Christmas, either. We anticipate the reunion of our relatives for weeks and months on end for Thanksgiving, Easter, and even non-holiday get-togethers. Underscoring that anticipation in many cases is the sense of separation — the time we have spent away from loved ones, the return of family members from faraway places, and the joy of reuniting no matter the occasion. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, the old saying goes; while that may or may not be true, absence reminds us of the love we have for one another, and how much we miss it during those separations.

In a sense, this is what Christmas means, too, and the entire arc of salvation history. Ever since the fall of Adam and Eve, humanity has kept separating itself from God, and paying the price for our stubbornness. Scriptures are filled with the cycle of devotion, rebellion, and disaster. The Lord sends us messengers and signs, anoints leaders, and offers His bounty repeatedly, only for us to strike out on our own and completely fail.

Even so, the Lord keeps inviting us back for a reunion with Him. In our first reading from Isaiah, the Lord promises that Jerusalem will be vindicated and His people reunited eternally with Him. “For the LORD delights in you and makes your land his spouse,” Isaiah prophesies. “As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.” The Lord wants us to return to Him, not as slaves or as chattel but as His family. God yearns for that permanent reunion, and His hand keeps giving us the opportunities to choose it.

And yet, by the time of Caesar Augustus and Herod, the Judeans are living in misery and under the domination of foreigners, and not for the first time. The Judean nation has put its trust in worldly alliances rather than in God. Their king is a lackey of Rome, and their temple leadership has been corrupted by power. The people yearn for a Messiah but have no idea what that means nor the salvation which will come from it.

Even so, the Lord wants to be reunited with His children who have grown so far away from Him that they cannot find their way back. This time, though, the Lord will not wait for us to come to Him — He will come to us, where we live and in the form of a newborn. They shall name him Emmanuel, which means “God with us.” And that is truly what happened on that first Advent, as the world held its breath and waited for the way home for our reunion with our God. The Lord came to our home, to love us and to show us the way to His home, and to provide the path for us to find the way there.

As Paul notes in our reading from Acts, God has been with us throughout all of salvation history:

With uplifted arm he led them out of it. Then he removed Saul and raised up David as king; of him he testified, ‘I have found David, son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will carry out my every wish.’ From this man’s descendants God, according to his promise, has brought to Israel a savior, Jesus.

Through all of these other events, the Lord worked through prophets, judges, and kings to lead His people back into His embrace. With Christ, God chose to send His Son in our form, condescending to embrace us where we live. That is how much He yearns for that reunion. And if our anticipation of salvation is powerful, imagine how deeply the Lord waits for us to return.

They shall name him Emmanuel, which means “God with us.” Will we declare ourselves with God, too? The Lord came to be with us in this first Christmas; will we take some time to be with Him in this Christmas, too?

May we all find ourselves in that blessed reunion, both in this season and eternity.

The front page image is a detail from “Madonna of the Meadow,” Giovanni Bellini, 1505. On display at the National Gallery in London.

“Sunday Reflection” is a regular feature, looking at the specific readings used in today’s Mass in Catholic parishes around the world. The reflection represents only my own point of view, intended to help prepare myself for the Lord’s day and perhaps spark a meaningful discussion. Previous Sunday Reflections from the main page can be found here.  For previous Green Room entries, click here.

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President Trump Wishes ‘Merry Christmas!’ To CNN With Bizarre Retweet

President Donald Trump is on vacation in Mar-a-Lago this weekend, celebrating the Christmas holiday with family, but he also seems to be on vacation from his own news cycle, stepping on a week’s worth of goodwill — perhaps the best week of his presidency — with a bizarre tweet about “crushing” CNN.

Sometime early Sunday morning, Trump retweeted a doctored photo of himself with a blood splatter on his shoe, conveniently tagged, “CNN.”

The re-tweet came amid a small, middle-of-the-night tweetstorm, taking CNN to task for its fake news, and refusing to report that now-former FBI director Andrew McCabe was allegedly in league with Clinton campaign officials, that the stock market is at a record high, and that Republicans have been successful in at least five Congressional races this year — all true statements, but all given an unseemly twist.

This is hardly the first time the President has stepped on his own successful news cycle, but it is perhaps the most egregious example of Trump’s itchy Twitter trigger finger getting the best of his public relations. After a successful week in Washington that included a revolutionary tax reform bill that even Bernie Sanders was unable to criticize on Sunday morning news programs, Trump should be riding high.

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University of Minnesota Distances Itself from Christmas Decoration Ban

Earlier this week we reported on an effort by the forced diversity police on the University of Minnesota campus in Minneapolis to severely restrict the display of traditional Christian and Jewish holiday decorations.

According to a memo that was circulated by SJW’s at a “Dean’s Dialogue” event:

The items, which the document describes as “not appropriate,” include bows, bells, depictions of Santa Claus, Christmas trees, wrapped gifts, nativity scenes, the star of Bethlehem, dreidels, angels and doves. Also included are decorations themed around the colors of red and green or blue and white.

“Red and green are representative of the Christian tradition as blue and white/silver are for Jewish Hanukkah that is also celebrated at this time of year,” the document states.

The memo made it clear that such items could potentially cause snowflakes to melt and urged that they be confined to personal safe spaces.

The University itself doesn’t seem to have been privy to the memo and is pushing back.

According to Campus Reform “University of Minnesota: Christmas guidelines ‘ill-advised’”:

The University of Minnesota has condemned a recent document that discouraged a host of holiday practices, saying its creation was “ill-advised.”

Susan Thurston Hamerski, media contact for CFANS, told Campus Reform at the time that the guidelines were used for conversations among faculty and staff, claiming that they are “not policy” and “not for distribution.”

Now, the university itself is taking additional measures to distance itself from the document, saying that “the actions of a single employee, whose attempt at a diversity training session was, to be blunt, ill advised,” and “does not constitute a policy on the part of the university.”

“We do not have such a policy, would never implement such a policy, and any representation otherwise is incorrect,” the university told Campus Reform in a statement. “Again, the University of Minnesota does not have a Religious and Diversity Holiday policy and has no intention of introducing such a policy.”

Becket, a religious liberty law firm, blasted the gudielines , even going so far as to award the department an Ebenezer Award, the “lowest (dis)honor, awarded for the most ridiculous affront to the Christmas and Hanukkah season.”

This one time, the Christmas spirit won out and vanquished the Scrooges and Grinches at UM.

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Government Of Canada Claims Santa Claus Has Fled The North Pole Because Of Global Warming

Bad news, kids: when Santa finishes his appointed rounds this evening, he’ll have no where to fly home to, according to the Government of Canada, because the North Pole has completely melted thanks to global Climate Change.

According to “Weak Signals” a project of the Canadian government designed to “conduct regular, ongoing environmental scanning to identify weak signals of possible change” across the globe, the North Pole is melting at such a rapid rate, it’s likely to be completely gone by this evening. As such, Santa has signed an “international agreement,” they say, to move his toy-making operation to the South Pole.

Member of Parliament John Brassard called attention to the sudden change on the “Weak Signals” website on Saturday, just as Canadian families were preparing for the Christmas holiday.

The announcement involved a surprising level of thought.

What?

Thanks to rising global temperatures, rapidly melting Arctic ice and growing human operations in the North, Santa Claus has signed an agreement with the International community to relocate his village next year to operate in an exclusive zone in the South Pole.

So What?

Santa’s relocation agreement marks the first time that the international community agrees on a common legal definition of climate change that includes refugees as corporations, as well as individuals. This deal is expected to lead to the deployment of a global climate change refugee visa system that in the near future could help to more easily relocate individuals and corporations facing the impacts of climate change.

While it is true that Arctic sea ice is at a record low, it’s not immediately clear that human activity has been a major factor in the ongoing climate change, or that any international consensus on the subject of “climate change” could make much of an impact. Winds, weather, snowfall levels, and changing sea currents are all factors that the govern the Arctic sea ice plain, and those has been in flux since the late 1970s, leading to slow changes over the course of several decades.

But the Canadian government’s environmental branch isn’t concerned with investigating slow, natural changes in the Earth’s environment, possibly spurred on in small part by human activity – they want to scare children into pestering their parents back into the Stone Age.

The good news for kids: Santa’s home in the North Pole is largely safe, at least for the next few decades, according to NASA.

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‘Every American Heart is Thankful:’ President Trump Wishes Overseas Soldiers ‘Very Merry Christmas’

‘Every American Heart is Thankful:’ President Trump Wishes Overseas Soldiers ‘Very Merry Christmas’

by John Binder24 Dec 2017Washington, D.C.0



President Trump praised the men and women of the American armed forces who are overseas during the Christmas season, expressing that “every American heart is thankful” for their service to the nation.

During a video conference call at Mar-a-Lago on Sunday, Trump addressed rooms full of deployed military personnel at five overseas bases in Qatar, Kuwait and Guantanamo Bay, wishing them a Merry Christmas and thanking them and their families for their service on behalf of the American people.

“I just want to wish everybody a very, very merry Christmas, we say Merry Christmas, again, very, very proudly,” Trump told the armed forces, according to White House pool reports. Very very merry Christmas. “We’re going to have a great year, an incredible year. I’m thrilled to bring seasons greetings on behalf of the first lady and our entire family and most importantly, on behalf of the American people.

“Today and every day we’re incredibly thankful for you and for your families,” Trump continued. “Your families have been tremendous. Always underappreciated, military families, the greatest people on earth.”

Trump specifically thanked the men and women of the U.S. Coast Guard for their efforts in the wake of multiple hurricanes that hit the country in the last five months.

“Many Republicans are very happy, but I have to tell you the people of Florida, Texas, Puerto Rico,  lots of other states are even more happy,” Trump said. “What a job you’ve done. The Coast Guard saved thousands and thousands of lives, almost it’s unbelievable when I look at the charts, I saw the number of lives you saved. So I want to congratulate the coast guard for having done an incredible job.”

Trump told the overseas armed forces that “Every American heart is thankful and we’re asking God to watch over you and to watch over your families.”

“As we celebrate this most precious holiday, we’re grateful for each of you who spend this Christmas away from our families and defend all of our families, our freedom and our flag,” Trump said.

While mentioning the military’s fight against the Islamic State (ISIS), he complimented the armed service members, saying “We’re winning.”

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.

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Mosul Celebrates First Post-Islamic State Christmas

Mosul Celebrates First Post-Islamic State Christmas

by Breitbart Jerusalem24 Dec 20170



MOSUL (IRAQ) (AFP) – Hymns filled a church in Iraq’s second city Mosul on Sunday as worshippers celebrated Christmas for the first time in four years after the end of jihadist rule.

Tens of thousands of Christians fled northern Iraqi towns in 2014 as the Islamic State group seized Mosul and swathes of the surrounding Nineveh province.

But Iraqi forces expelled the jihadists from the city this year after months of battle, allowing Christians to return to pray at Saint Paul’s church.

On Sunday morning, the patriarch of Iraq’s Chaldean Catholic Church, Patriarch Louis Raphael Sako, called on dozens to pray for “peace and stability in Mosul, Iraq and the world”.

Muslims, as well as local and military officials, stood with Christian worshippers amid the candles and Christmas trees.

On the church’s walls, white sheets covered up window frames blasted empty in the war.

Armoured vehicles sat outside the church, where the portrait of a Christian killed under IS rule was displayed as a reminder of the city’s grim recent history.

Farqad Malko, a Christian woman in the congregation, said celebrating the mass on Christmas Eve was “important to relaunch Christian life” in the city.

She is one of the few to have returned to the area after Iraqi forces defeated IS in the city in July.

She said she was determined “to work and go to church in Mosul”.

The jihadists’ defeat is a massive turnaround for an organisation that once ruled over millions of people in a territory as big as Italy encompassing large parts of Syria and nearly a third of Iraq.

This month Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared victory in the three-year campaign backed by a US-led coalition to expel IS from Iraq.

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Is that a sleigh with eight reindeer overhead? No… it’s a UFO

I’m not going to be the wet blanket who discounts sightings of Santa Claus this evening. (You can track Saint Nick’s progress at Norad to save yourself some time outdoors.) But as we wait for Christmas to arrive, I wanted to share some thoughts on what appears to be a subtle shift in the attitudes of other people looking up into the night skies.

For a long time now it’s been absolute taboo for anyone in the professional media (or any other “proper” social circles for that matter) to talk about the idea of intelligent extraterrestrial beings hanging around in the vicinity of the Earth except in jest. To do otherwise was an invitation to exile with the rest of the kooks, nuts and general conspiracy theorists. But after that curious report in the New York Times which I wrote about recently, I’m sensing a change.

People who would formerly never have uttered more than a few one-liners on the subject suddenly seem just a tad bit more open to at least suggesting… a possibility. We’ve been hearing stories and whispers from people who (sometimes at least) don’t really seem all that insane, claiming that they saw or experienced… something. Oh, to be sure, we all have to quickly add stern, grown-up caveats about how it could still be explained by something totally mundane. But there’s also been a muted “maybe” attached ever since that New York Times story came out, exposing the revelation that the government has indeed been up to… something related to the subject. One such story came from the completely sensible and practical Michael Brendan Dougherty at National Review.

Over time I put away Mysteries of the Unknown and tried to forget my nightmarish preoccupations with life out there. And on balance, I resolved to believe we probably are alone. I’m fine being the sort of person unsophisticated enough to believe humanity really is at the center of the great cosmic drama, that all this space, all those lights, all the cosmic flashes, and all this beautiful and scary mystery was daubed across the great blackness for us. In fact I think this is the more humble view, the one that accepts that humanity isn’t left to “socially construct” all the meaning for itself.

But once in a while, I think it is okay to take a second glance at the mysterious picture and think to yourself the words on that poster in Mulder’s office: “I want to believe.”

Dougherty isn’t the only one quoting Fox Mulder’s poster this month. Sure, there are still some dour individuals like Matthew Walther who sensibly remind us that too much obsession with what’s “out there” can lead us to ignore, neglect and further ruin the infinite mystery of what’s right in front of our eyes here on Earth. But then there are eminently respectable eggheads like Rafi Letzter, a science reporter at Scientific American (among other journals), who seems to have folded a slightly shifted attitude toward the extraterrestrial phenomenon into his baseline. He spends a great deal of time in this article criticizing the New York Times discussion of the “unusual alloys” allegedly being stockpiled in Las Vegas. This is because he feels that we already have a reliable grasp on the science of such things to the point where we could identify most any alloy we encounter or, if not, could define the properties of a new one quickly.

All of that is fair enough from the perspective of most metallurgists I suppose. But Letzter also tosses in the following paragraph, as if it were the most normal thing in the world. It’s the part where he outlines the three main “bombshells” in the New York Times article. (Emphasis added)

1. Many high-ranking people in the federal government believe aliens have visited planet Earth.

2. Military pilots have recorded videos of UFOs with capabilities that seem to outstrip all known human aircraft, changing direction and accelerating in ways no fighter jet or helicopter could ever accomplish.

3. In a group of buildings in Las Vegas, the government stockpiles alloys and other materials believed to be associated with UFOs.

Points one and two are weird, but not all that compelling on their own: The world already knew that plenty of smart folks believe in alien visitors, and that pilots sometimes encounter strange phenomena in the upper atmosphere – phenomena explained by entities other than space aliens, such as a weather balloon, a rocket launch or even a solar eruption.

That’s very strange to read in a scientific journal rather than, let’s say, the website of Mysterious Universe. The author blithely points out that “plenty of smart folks” are already believers (or at least those who truly want to believe) from the school of Fox Mulder. Not hopeless, borderline schizophrenics who have gone off their meds or con artists looking to pitch their next reality show. Smart people leading otherwise respectable lives.

Yes, he includes the still (mostly) mandatory caveat about how many sightings can be attributed to decidedly non-alien phenomena. But what we saw in the government video was something else. A fifty-foot long white tic tac with no wings, rotors or exhaust ports which was solid and could be tracked from multiple radar stations, dropping down from 80K feet to hover over the ocean, be filmed by (multiple) experienced Navy pilots, and then leave a pair of Super Hornets capable of doing nearly Mach 2 in the dust? That was no balloon, swamp gas, ball lightning or trick of the light, bending the image of a solar flare through some inversion layer in the atmosphere. So what was it? We don’t know yet, and we might not unless the military knows more and cares to tell us. It’s unidentified. Hence the acronym.

So if I see something in the sky tonight that I can’t identify, sure… I’ll leave room for the possibility that it might be Santa on his sleigh. Or, just perhaps, it might be something else. It’s a big, empty looking universe. But at least in the way it’s being treated in the “respectable” media now, it may have just gotten a tad bit smaller and perhaps even a bit more crowded. So do I Believe? Not yet, because I haven’t experienced anything like that myself thus far and, as Carl Sagan once said, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. But I’m at least willing to say in public that I really want to. There’s more room in our world for Fox Mulders now, as long as we keep a healthy supply of Dana Scullys around to peer review the findings.

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Saying ‘Merry Christmas’ Is Racist And Hitler-Like According To Newsweek

In a year where we learned that trees and milk are racist, It’s probably not all that surprising that saying “Merry Christmas” is on par with a hate crime. According to Newsweek, not only is this holiday greeting racist, doing so pretty much makes you Hitler. Yup, this sorry leftist rag masquerading as a news source has managed to link “Merry Christmas” with the Nazis.

You think I’m kidding about this? Here’s a real headline that Newsweek thought was news: HOW TRUMP AND THE NAZIS STOLE CHRISTMAS TO PROMOTE WHITE NATIONALISM

The article is as unhinged as the headline. It starts out by griping that President Trump has frequently said that it’s okay to say “Merry Christmas” again. They accuse Trump of waging war on those who have been waging a war on Christmas.

Now here’s where the Newsweek article goes completely off the rails of sanity:

Wishing people “merry Christmas” instead of “happy holidays,” is thus in line with Trump’s decision to ban citizens of Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States…It fits neatly with his refusal to condemn white supremacists when they march against diversity, and with his condemnation of athletes who protest police brutality against black men.

With this in mind, the fight to end the war on Christmas is exclusionary politics at its most flagrant.

Don’t just take Newsweek’s word for it, they went out and found an “expert.” Richard King is a liberal professor who, “studies how white supremacists exploit culture” because that’s apparently a thing and he thinks…

“I see such invocations of Christmas as a kind of cypher, what some would call a dog whistle. It does not appear to be intolerant or extreme, but to attentive audiences it speaks volumes about identity and belonging—who and what are fully American,” said King.

And everyone knows that liberal college professors have the best opinions about everything.

“Much like ‘Make America Great Again,’ panics over the protests by NFL players, and the defense of Confederate memory, Christmas is a way to talk about peril, to assert a soft or hard version of white nationalism,” King said.

You got that? Saying “Merry Christmas” is now asserting hard white nationalism, or in other words, very very racist. But how do the Nazis factor into all of this, you must be wondering:

Trump isn’t the first political figure in history to co-opt Christmas. In fact, some see parallels between Trump’s speeches in front of Christmas trees and attempts by authoritarian regimes like the Nazis to manipulate popular celebrations to promote a political ideology. But by weaponizing Christmas in this way, Trump is bringing a dangerous tradition of politicizing religious holidays into the United States…

In this context, Trump has been using the so-called war on Christmas to wage a culture war that pits multicultural liberals against Christian conservatives.

Likewise, Nazi Germany’s propagandists rooted their idea of Christmas in visions of ethno-nationalism. They rewrote the lyrics of Christmas carols, promoted Nazified holiday traditions and launched numerous Christmas charity events for poor Germans. The ultimate goal was to draw a clear line between those who belonged and those who should be excluded, those who could not benefit from the joys of Christmas.

That may be the dumbest thing ever written and the worst parallel ever drawn, but I do kind of like the the new term “Nazified.” I think it would be better used however to describe the increasingly fascist left, who now thinks that people celebrating the birth of Christ are racist monsters.

Finally there is a competing dumb statement from another Newsweek expert. Joe Perry (not Aerosmith’s guitarist) is some guy who wrote a book and he thinks this:

“Trump and the Nazis share aspects of race-baiting and perhaps broader aspects of extreme conservatism—many political ideologies do,” said Perry.

Yeah, nobody on the left ever race-baits *cough* Sharpton *cough* Jackson *cough* every liberals ever *cough*. Also, Nazis were fascists, which is a leftist ideology. Leftists are not conservatives nor is conservatism “extremist” by any stretch of the imagination.

While all of this seems very stupid it’s actually good news. We now have another fun and simple way to trigger a hysterical liberal reaction. Simply wish a lefty a Merry Christmas and then sit back and watch the hilarity. It’s like shaking a bottle of carbonated crazy and then seeing it opened in a liberal’s face.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, RESISTANCE!

Follow Brian Anderson on Twitter

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Homeowner Association Bullies Family Over ‘JESUS’ Christmas Display

With only two more shopping days until Christmas, there is plenty of Bah Humbug to go around in Adams County, Pennsylvania where a family has been bullied into taking down a holiday display.

The Wivell family’s desire to honor the religious aspects of Christmas with a lighted decoration that simply says “JESUS” has raised the ire of some of the neighborhood Grinches who filed a complaint with the board of the Courtyards Homeowners Association in Mount Joy Township.

The HOA is contending that the “JESUS” decoration is a sign and therefore violates the community rules and that it must come down according to the association president.

There are always spoilsports who just can’t accept that people may actually enjoy Christmas and want to express their tribute to the lord and savior whose birth is the true reason for the celebration of the day.

According to Harrisburg Fox affiliate, Fox 43 “Christmas display causes controversy in Adams County community”:

Is it a sign or Christmas decoration? An Adams County family is fighting back after the homeowners association where they live demanded the removal of a disputed item, a piece of wood that says Jesus on it, from their yard.

Mark and Lynn Wivell say they wanted to make a statement with their Christmas decorations this year.

“As part of our Christmas decoration, we would display the name Jesus to point out to everyone that we in this family believe that the reason for the season is to celebrate the birth of Jesus,” said Mark Wivell, who put the display up on Saturday,

But where the Wivells live, their homeowners association has a big say in what can go up or come down.

The HOA told them Sunday a neighbor found their Jesus sign offensive, and a day later said signage like this was not allowed.

But the Wivells contend that it’s not a sign, rather a Christmas decoration.

“We have ordinances with regard to Christmas decorations, and my Christmas decorations comply with the HOA ordinances on Christmas decorations,” Wivell said.

The Courtyards HOA board issued a statement to FOX43, in part saying quote: “It is, indeed, unfortunate that our attention has been unnecessarily redirected in this manner with a suggestion that Scrooge is alive and well in our community.  Many of our families will be in church on Monday with their spirit diminished by this attack.”

The family says many other people have supported their display.

“When this happened, we were really shocked,” said Lynn Wivell. “We have gotten tremendous support from our neighbors here at the Links and that just makes us feel so good.”

The Wivells plan on keeping the display up until January 15th, when the rules say all displays must come down. They still do not know who was reportedly offended by the display.

Additional commentary via the Gettysburg Times “Homeowners’ group wants ‘Jesus’ out of community”:

Wivell has lived in the community since 2005 and said he is familiar with the guidelines in the Public Offering Statement (POS), which residents sign when they move in. Being familiar with the rule that prohibits decorations in the yard, Wivell made sure to put the decoration in the mulch bed outside his home, he said.

Wivell argues it is “not technically a sign,” but a Christmas decoration that complies with the POS. The Courtyards board disagrees.

A second email sent to Wivell, this time from the entire three-member board, explained how the sign is in violation. Tom Fischer and Karen Landry also sit on the board.

Quoting the POS, the board wrote, “No signs or billboard of any kind shall be displayed to the public view on any unit ”

The email continued on to say it is a “key responsibility” of the board to address complaints from homeowners regarding “matters that are in conflict” with the community’s rules.

“We simply cannot decide to enforce some standards and allow other standards to be ignored,” the board wrote.

Having personally served on HOA boards it is not a stretch to say that they serve to attract some of the worst elements in any neighborhood including cranks, petty authority freaks and those who want to exploit their position to rule over their enemies.

The Wivells should tell the HOA to get stuffed, it is Christmas and like the Confederate statues that put a bug up so many liberal asses, if you don’t like it, don’t look at it.

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How the Creator of ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’ Got the Gospel Past CBS Execs

Watching A Charlie Brown Christmas has been a tradition for millions since it first aired on December 9, 1965. While many love the iconic Vince Guaraldi score, the humor and the animation, one part of the special has always stood out and made it unique: Linus’s recitation of the Gospel of Luke. 

In 2015, The Washington Post published a retrospective on A Charlie Brown Christmas. Michael Cavna explained Peanuts creator Charles Schulz’s mission in making the special: 

 

 

Charles Schulz insisted on one core purpose: A Charlie Brown Christmas had to be about something. Namely, the true meaning of Christmas. Otherwise, Schulz said, “Why bother doing it?”

To Coca-Cola’s credit, Mendelson says, the corporate sponsor never balked at the idea of including New Testament passages. The result — Linus’s reading from the Book of Luke about the meaning of the season — became “the most magical two minutes in all of TV animation,” the producer says.

Schulz stood strong, despite efforts to talk him out of quoting from the Bible. On December 5, 2005, USA Today recounted: 

[Executive producer Lee] Mendelson and animator Bill Melendez fretted about the insistence by Peanuts creator Charles Schulz that his first-ever TV spinoff end with a reading of the Christmas story from the Gospel of Luke by a lisping little boy named Linus.

“We told Schulz, ‘Look, you can’t read from the Bible on network television,’ ” Mendelson says. “When we finished the show and watched it, Melendez and I looked at each other and I said, ‘We’ve ruined Charlie Brown.’ “

According to a recounting on MentalFloss.com, CBS executives told Schulz: “You can’t read from the Bible on network television.” 

Mental Floss writer Kara Kovalchik recounted what happened next: 

But CBS had made a commitment to their sponsor, so they aired the special as scheduled on December 9, 1965. And, as often happens in the world of entertainment, the original gut reaction of the suits was completely wrong. A Charlie Brown Christmas drew in 15.4 million viewers, placing it second in the ratings that week after Bonanza. A few months later, Charles Schulz and Lee Mendelson found themselves onstage accepting an Emmy Award for Outstanding Children’s Program. 

And so, the Charlie Brown creator persevered and created a Christmas classic that endures 52 years later. 

In case you don’t remember the iconic moment, here it is: 

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying: ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on Earth, peace and goodwill towards men.’

“That’s what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.” 

via NewsBusters – Exposing Liberal Media Bias

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