Posted on 11/06/2001 8:02:15 AM PST by marshmallow
LONDON, Nov 5, 01 (CWNews.com) - Residents of Luton, England, will not be able to celebrate Christmas this year. Instead, the town's official ceremonies will be re-branded "Luminos," a word taken from the wildly popular line of Harry Potter books.
In it's attempts to be all-inclusive, the town on the outskirts of London has been accused of "politically correct paranoia" by both Christian and Muslim groups. Iain Bainbridge, a spokesman for the Christian Institute, described the approach as a "ridiculous overreaction."
"It is not so much an agenda of sensitivity to other faiths as a secular agenda," he told The Times. "In areas where you have large numbers of a certain ethnic group it is quite normal for specifically religious celebrations to be accepted."
He continued, "It is political correctness gone mad. In a country with a strong Christian heritage and a predominantly Christian constitution it is crazy not to have this manifest at Christmas. We are renowned as a country of religious tolerance but it now appears as if the Christian faith is respected the least."
Akhbar Dad Khan, the former general secretary of Luton's Islamic Cultural Society and an interfaith spokesman for the Islamic community, said the Christian complaint was entirely understandable. "All people from all faiths recognize and appreciate each other," he said. "We do live in a predominantly Christian society and people from other faiths have accepted that. Each faith has its own characteristics and the celebration of any particular faith would not offend anyone else. We are all grown up."
Luton is the latest British town to come under fire for changing the name of Christmas. Glasgow's festivities have been renamed "Shine On" and, more recently "Winter Festival." Birmingham has used the term "Winterval" and Sheffield no longer has Christmas illuminations but has changed to "city lights."
You can tell these people the truth until you are blue in the face (blue in the fingertips?), but you will not pierce the hardened heart. Unless, maybe, when they experience the heartache of seeing their children go beyond the door opened by the "innocuous, innocent, healthy" Potter books to dig deeper into the practice of witchcraft and the occult--but, then again, maybe not.
I really don't see how anyone who has Holy Spirit enlightenment can condone these books and encourage their children to read them. And for those of you who throw out CS Lewis' books, his witches were always evil, I believe. (And, to be frank, the jury is out in my mind whether the "fantasy" genre (Tolkein and Lewis included) is right for me and my family altogether. I'm not sure that it's the highest.
Yes folks, it's true alright. Read it and weep.
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- with apologies to Dr. Seuss.
This is one of the most shameful, outrageously offensive posts that I ever been subjected to.
The man is in Toledo.
Wake up!
Disgusting. God will not be mocked.
I've noticed most posters (not all) who like Harry Potter are probably not parents. Most people with kids know how impressionable children are. It's just oh-so sophisticated to say witchcraft is harmless fun.
These books were surely written according to a very specific agenda. And just as certainly, they were published and given this massive publicity push in order to achieve those ends.
The hoped-for result is idot towns like this, who abolish Christmas in favor of blasphemy.
No, make that IDIOT.
The solution is not to issue whiny press releases. The solution is for all churches in the area to band together and announce a giant Christmas Day gathering in the middle of town. Ten thousand Christians taking over the city on Dec. 25 would be the ultimate "up yours" to the multicult.
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