Taking back Christmas

[notyoubob]

Larimer sheriff launches pro-Christmas decoration plan
The official says a Fort Collins plan for less-religious decorations is an assault on freedoms.
By Monte Whaley

The Denver Post
Article Last Updated: 11/16/2007 06:39:08 AM MST



To heck with white lights and an all-inclusive "holiday" celebration as touted by a Fort Collins citizens group, the Larimer County sheriff said this week.
Sheriff Jim Alderden believes such a secular event runs counter to what most people in America and Larimer County hold to be true - Christ and Christmas. So Alderden is putting up his own Christmas - "not a holiday" - tree outside the county sheriff's administration building and is asking people to decorate it Dec. 1.
Alderden wants "members of the public who share our faith or object to government intrusion into our religious freedoms to join us," he wrote Wednesday in his weekly newsletter to employees and outside subscribers.
Alderden titled his letter "Fort Collins Boulderized: the Task Force that Denied Christmas."
The task force wants the City Council on Tuesday to adopt new regulations for holiday decorations on city-owned buildings that downplay religious symbols and holidays while emphasizing secular displays and white lights.
An annual display in and around the Fort Collins Museum is part of the recommendation. The museum site could include several non-religious and religious symbols, including a Nativity and menorah, say city officials.
But Alderden thinks the city is trying to brush aside the building blocks of American society - Christianity.
"The fact that we are even engaged in a discourse of whether Christmas trees and Christian symbols of faith should be allowed on city property is absurd," Alderden said. "Our country, and sadly our own community, has reached that point where people of good faith and good conscience can no longer stand silently while a belligerent minority usurps our heritage."
The sheriff's administration building is on county-owned land and immune from city restrictions. Alderden was out of town Thursday and couldn't be reached for comment.
County Manager Frank Lancaster said the county has no policies against erecting Christmas trees on its property. "The sheriff is very passionate about this," Lancaster said. "And we have no problems with it."
Task force member Seth Anthony said the group worked in good faith to keep the city's holiday celebration open to everyone, including non-Christians. ?

[Highwayman]

What appears to be attracting controversy is another recommendation that would not allow colored lights and other symbols associated with Christmas in other outside public areas.

"The council's intent was to be positive, be expansive, to be more inclusive. I'm not sure why we would want to restrict any aspect of what has been years and years of traditional holiday displays," said Fort Collins Mayor Doug Hutchinson, who has received angry calls from many people, some of whom claim the city is stealing Christmas.

However, those with the task force say its proposal is appropriate.

"We have to be careful that the displays that we have not endorse any particular religion. Putting things in a multicultural context, or an educational context really helps us be very safely on the good side of the First Amendment," said Anthony, who is an ACLU member.

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=80508

I think that I see the problem.