Posted on 12/23/2013 5:39:15 PM PST by Faith Presses On
As I recall, retail stores started being open on Thanksgiving about a decade ago. The first ones to my knowledge were stores like Dollar General and Family Dollar. That was later followed by KMart, etc., and now most stores are open. These stores are now open on Easter, too, for some years. And last year, for the first time that I've noticed it, Dollar General (and probably others) is open on Christmas. So what do Christians think of this? I myself think it's terrible, and is another sign of where our country is headed.
IIRC there are some words that have a bit to do with the founding of this country.
"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
I get the point but you might be surprised to know:
The Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth Centuries
Apparently no later than the seventh century, history suggests that there were Sabbath-keepers in China who claimed Christianity.
“Christianity Today” (CT) reported the following on Christianity in China:
Did You Know?
In 635, a Christian leader from Persia named Alopen arrived in Chang’an, the capital of the Tang dynasty. Christianity was at first welcomed by the Chinese. But two centuries later, imperial persecution forced Christians to flee mainland China. A nine-foot-tall limestone monument in Chang’an, erected in 781, commemorates the “Luminous Religion” brought by Alopen and his fellow missionaries. (http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/index.html#didyouknow viewed 08/03/09).
The following excerpt provides more information on this:
The Chang-An Monument
“It was in the year 1625; the Jesuits had infiltrated the fabric of the Chinese cultured classes, when a sensational discovery was made. A large monument stone inscribed with nineteen hundred Chinese characters, and fifty Syrian words, was unearthed just outside the walls of Chang-An, the ancient capital of the Tang Dynasty. The news of this discovery caused a bustle of excitement in the ancient metropolitan city, and thousands were anxious to know what information about their cultural heritage was hidden in the writing.
The Jesuits, who were regarded as the teachers and scholars, were immediately summoned to decipher the inscriptions. To the astonishment of these haughty priests, there before their eyes, was a description of the prestigious position, and vast extent of the seventh-day Sabbath-keeping Christian Church of the East of a millennia before!
The ancient Chinese characters were inscribed in 781 AD, at the command of Emperor Tae-Tsung, to honor the arrival of an Assyrian missionary and his companions to the capitol in the year 635 AD from Ta Tsin, or Judea. The stone revealed beliefs and practices of the primitive Christian church, which were unrelated and out of harmony with the Roman Catholic beliefs.
One of the passages reads:
“On the Seventh Day we offer sacrifices after having purified our hearts, and received absolution from our sins. This religion, so perfect and so excellent, is difficult to name, but it enlightens darkness by its brilliant precepts.”
In a state of shock, the Jesuits, and the Mandarins, a class of scholarly religious Chinese rulers, worked to alter the Chinese characters to reflect the Catholic doctrines, for if the expectant population were to learn what the stone really said, it would greatly damage their beliefs in the Catholic doctrines, and diminish the influence of the Mandarins.
But something very different than the expected resulted. Today, after carefully comparing the known facts of history with an examination of the historical and doctrinal facts written on the stone, a fraud is obvious.
The Chang-An Monument, or the “speaking stone,” as it is called, is considered to be as important a find as the Rosetta Stone, for it had the inscriptions in more than one language. The truth was preserved because the Jesuits were not able to read the inscription that was in Syrian.
From the reading of the stone today an irrefutable fact of history quickly becomes obvious. That ancient Sabbath-keeping Christianity had been very prominent and extensive throughout the Orient as late as the eighth and ninth centuries. “ (Excerpt from “Our Sabbath Heritage” by James Arrabito. Sabbath Sentinel. September-October 2000).
How long some in China kept the Sabbath is unclear. But apparently some did. And since that monument dates from the eighth century to commemorate the arrival from Judea of missionaries in 635, it is certainly possible that Sabbath-keeping occurred well after the monument was made. It is also possible that Sabbath-keeping occurred in China previous to that particular missionary trip and that no records were made (or at least found) as well.
Here is more information about this period:
The earliest record of any Christian mission to China is found inscribed on the Nestorian monument in Sianfu, erected in A.D. 781. Sianfu was the capital of the T’ang empire (A.D. 618-906) and the center of the then-greatest civilization in the world. This monument recorded the visit to the T’ang court of a band of Christians led by Alopen from Ta-chin (Syria). Alopen brought with him the “true scriptures.” They were given to T’ang T’ai-tsung who commanded that they be translated in the royal library. These Christians flourished under royal sponsorship until A.D. 845, when they suffered persecution, and soon afterward, near extinction...
In 1908 other Christian documents were found...Sir Aurel Stein, a British archaeologist, purchased these ancient manuscripts, one of which was dated 641 A.D., and is thus the oldest Chinese translation of any gospel portion. It is thought that these documents were written by the same Christian group as those in Sianfu (Kang C.H., Nelson E.R. The Discovery of Genesis: How the Truths of Genesis Were Found Hidden in the Chinese Language. Concordia Publishing House, St. Louis, 1979, p. 28).
Don’t shop on Christmas.
When the cost benefit ratio nails them, they’ll quit poking Christians in the eye.
Their choice. Doesn’t mean I have to shop there.
I told my husband that I heard Walgreens was going to be open. He said, “Good. People do get sick on Christmas, and an open pharmacy would really be helpful.”
In general, businesses should close, but a lot of people travel on Chriestmas, and they need some services, so there should be some gas stations, motels and restaurants open, as well as pharmacies, per above.
....”employees want to pick a few extra bucks....employees usually make double, or more”....
Not so fast....this was true at one time, and employees who wanted volantered because there were enough to do so. Not so in the retail climate today. You don’t have that leisure to choose.
Further office politics come into play....”Favorites” get time off and choice select days and hours while the others get slammed with brutal work hours.
When the box stores decided to open Thanksgiving Evening....the favorites worked from eight to midnight and were paid time and half for four hours. Those who worked midnight til 8:00 black Friday morning...( staying up all night to great the additional busiest day of the year) were paid regular time even though they had twice the workload. Further they had to come back into work that day by 3:00.
Many in the store I work had no time to even squeeze Thanksgiving in....it was not fun by any means and many were disgusted enough to begin looking for other work....enough was enough.
Additionally the week after Christmas any money you is lost as they cut hours dramatically.....some to just four hours that week and throughout January and Feb. So your basically loosing, and then some, anything you might have made that one day.
There were other variables that also come into play.....so I vote no to Holiday shopping. I just came off a ten hour day today...non-stop back to back...to go into work yet again tomorrow til close....close to forty hours in four days....and I’m “Part-time”. The full time people did not work half as much.
You need to start your own business and run it the way you want to run it, instead of “voting” how you want to force others to run theirs….
Certainly the cost benefit analysis is why some are open on Christmas, and if that reverses, they will not open - but seriously, you think this is their way of poking Christians in the eye? C’mon…..
But some stores being open is a symptom, not a cause……and frankly, most of them are closed anyway.
Thank-you for telling it just like it is. A good and blessed Merry Christmas to you and your dear ones.
Bah Humbug!
You were the bah humbug poster…..wanting to force your designs on others….
And thank you for joining the occupy wall street business haters on FR…..
Well said. Your points are spot on and show what happens when one lives somewhere other than (what is left of) a constitutional republic
Or capitalism.
MY business is closing early on Christmas Eve and will be closed on Christmas Day. I will also be closed on New Year’s Day. I also choose to be closed on Sundays - in my belief they aren’t The Ten Suggestions.
I would hope in this land of freedom and liberty that all businesses would have the right to decide what days they will and will not operate.
As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.
In Germany they vote on it, in each state. Compared to the US, Germany has very limited shopping hours.
A federal law in Germany requires most stores to be closed Sundays.
A few other countries’ rules for shopping hours:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shopping_hours
If it IS being accurately described as the “holiday season” (Thanksgiving through New Year’s) WHY are all of the POST-Holiday sales on Dec. 26? Why not Jan 2nd???
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