Reply to If you are a non religious household, how do you handle religious holidays or Santa, etc?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]We are Hindus and love to celebrate Christmas.  For us, in a non-pandemic year,  it is a long series of celebrations that start from Navratris, Karva Chauth, Diwali, TG, Christmas, New Years and  ends in Valentine Day.  Then we begin again with Holi in March.

Then we stuff ourselves to the gills with food and celebrations. We may look nerdy and studious but in reality we are party animal  foodies. And no one parties like Santa. Dude hops from one house to another the whole night. And he has an Indian gut! Our kind of guy!![/quote]

Party-on!  There are many reasons to do so.  But why make irrationality (religion) part of it?  [/quote]

Any celebration that celebrates some kind of goodness or joy, and couples it with fun traditions, family/community, good food - be it religious or secular - is worth participating in.  There is no downside to celebrating it. Also, it is one way to honor the fact that we live in a diverse country, and have friends who are diverse, and I think that my participation gives me a small understanding of what my Christian friends experience.

Celebrate in a respectful manner and in a secular manner. I am always touched when I am invited to friends with different religious persuasions than me to share in their religious celebration. I don't want to live in a narrow silo.  [/quote]

Yes. Obligatory:

DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
Papa says, ‘If you see it in THE SUN it’s so.’
Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

VIRGINIA O’HANLON.
115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET.

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

https://www.newseum.org/exhibits/online/yes-virginia-there-is-a-santa-claus/
[/quote]

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