My Christmas Survey: A Closer Look

I'm old as dirt and my upbringing reflects that. Though I attended public schools after the Supreme Court ruled against school prayer, the unspoken rule was to see what you could get away with. My elementary school had a Nativity pageant with traditional Christmas carols. One teacher asked if we had been to church or Sunday School for Easter. A daily devotional was blasted over the intercom when I was in junior high. There was clearly an expectation that "everyone" was Christian, or at least should be. Of course, even in those days, not everyone was.

Today our country is more diverse than ever, and the question for non-religious institutions like public schools and Girl Scouts isn't "Do we keep Christ in Christmas?" but rather "How do we respect all people during this time of year?"

Tonight I had the pleasure of speaking to Julie from Los Angeles about my survey on the holiday season and Girl Scouts.  You can read about the survey here.  While l have formatted this post in a Q & A format, our conversation was not this structured, and what is written below is not a direct quote.  After I wrote this post, I sent it to Julie so she could add to or correct any answers she felt did not accurately reflect what she said or what she meant.  

Q:  Thanks for offering to speak to me more on this topic.  Can you tell me a little about yourself and your family?

1. My husband and I were born on the east coast and have moved to Los Angeles.  We have a daughter who is a Senior Girl Scout.  My husband and I both come from Jewish families and we identify as Jewish mostly in a cultural way, though we are not very religiously observant.

Q. While on an overall basis I was not terribly surprised by what activities on my survey people thought were appropriate for Girl Scouts vs what they did not, particularly with a diverse troop, when looking at the responses of individual people I was somewhat surprised at the combinations of things they found appropriate vs not.  

1.  When I was doing your survey, I was discussing the items with my husband and my daughter and it led to some interesting points.  We didn’t always agree on everything.

Q.  Really, like which ones?

1. Coloring Christmas themed placemat for Meals on Wheels for example.  My husband said “no”, my daughter said “yes”.  

Q:  Why?

1. My husband’s thought was that coloring Christmas scenes was a Christmas activity.  My daughter agreed that it was, but said that if these placemats were what was requested by Meals on Wheels as a service project from Girl Scouts, she saw it as doing service rather than celebrating Christmas.

Q.  One thing I found interesting about the survey results was how many more people found it appropriate to sing “Frosty the Snowman” as opposed to coloring a picture of Rudolph.  To me, from my point of view, they are both made-up characters who make an appearance at Christmas. Do you have any explanation I missed?

1. To me, Rudolph is connected to Santa who is a Christmas character. If you get rid of Christmas, you get rid of Santa, and with him, Rudolph.  Frosty just happens be associated with this time of year.  Even if there was no Christmas, there would still be winter and snow at least in places where that is normal. In LA, we go sledding on sand dunes, not snow.

Q.  Sand Dunes?  Never thought of that--we don’t get snow either and that sounds like fun.  

Q.  So, is there any difference between coloring a picture of Rudolph and coloring a nativity scene?  I always figured that as long as I stayed away from religion I was ok.

1. To me, it’s a spectrum, but it’s all on a Christmas spectrum.  Rudolph is secular. A nativity scene is religious.  But it’s all Christmas.  

Q:  What about handing out treats at the community light display?

A: I think that most holiday light displays are Christmas based - Christmas is the assumed default.  Unless it’s specifically winter themed with no holiday displays or unless there are an equal number of displays for all holidays celebrated (Hanukkah, Solstice, Kwanzaa, Christmas, etc.), the community light display is a Christmas event, so no.   

Q.  Though the totals were not all that different, I had noticed that more than a few people found ornaments acceptable but not star and candy cane shaped cookies, or vice versa.  When I put them on the list I thought it was kind of a toss up, but figured that people would say the same for each--they’d either say both were acceptable, or that neither was.  

1. This was one of the times when language is especially important.  An ornament is something you hang on a tree, which not all people have; whereas a winter snowman  decoration goes anywhere you want - on a tree or somewhere else entirely.  Words matter.  Stars and candy canes are pretty generic, but my troop decorates plain round cookies and each girl can decorate hers in any way she wants.  

Q.  What about a Christmas party?

1. My troop has a generic end of the year event.  Sometimes it’s a party.  Sometimes it’s a field trip or activity.  But it’s always about just being together and never about holidays.  

Q.  My girls want to do some Christmas activities.  None of the girls have voiced an objection.  If all these girls are going home to celebrate Christmas in one form or another it seems silly to avoid it at Girl Scouts but I don’t want to turn one girl into the one who ruined all the fun, nor do I want anyone suffering in silence.  Is it ok to ask the girls if they celebrate Christmas? Should I ask the parents?  

1. I actually object to the phrasing of this question - it’s not a Scout who is “ruining all the fun.” There’s nothing preventing a group having fun regardless of the religious or cultural beliefs of the members of the group. If one person not celebrating what you believe ruins your fun and you blame that person, then I don’t see that as being a sister to every Girl Scout.    

If your troop wants to do something holiday themed, I would start by asking the girls about their holiday traditions this time of year. If everyone celebrates Christmas, maybe you can move forward with it.  But if they don’t, this might be a good opportunity for everyone to share a bit about their customs.  One of the questions in your survey was about the dreidel game - this would be a great opportunity for girls who celebrate Christmas to share something they do at the holiday and girls who celebrate Hanukkah to share something like the dreidel game and girls who celebrate another holiday to share the things they do to celebrate.  

Q.  I guess being on the outside looking in really gives you a different perspective on all of this than those of us who are in the majority have.

1. Yes, but I think everyone comes to Scouting (and life, really) with their own personal biases.  This year at Halloween I got treats for my Girl Scouts and “Boo’d“ them, only to find out that one of my girl’s family does not celebrate Halloween.  We’ve done engineering projects using Halloween candy and we built Leprechaun traps at St. Patrick’s Day, though I didn’t explicitly call it a St. Patrick’s Day project and now I wish I had been more thoughtful about incorporating any holidays at all.  

Q. I’m Catholic, and we have churches called St. Patrick and I’ve taught my kids about him, and I don’t really think about St. Patrick’s Day or Valentine’s Day as religious holidays, but my college roommate was raised Jehovah's Witness and she said that her mother would always come and pull her out of school when the school had Christmas parties, passed out Valentine or basically anything that celebrated any holidays.  

Do you think all Jewish people would answer these questions the same way you did?  A majority?

1. Jewish folks are not a monolith - I would never speak for anyone other than myself and my experience. 

I’d like to thank Julie again for taking the time to talk to me. Hopefully our conversation has given you food for thought about how to make this a wonderful time of year for all your girls.