Mr. Avrech,

Comcast is showing "A Stranger Among Us" for free on digital cable so I managed to sit down and watch it the other day. It's as well done as I remember. I laughed when Ariel talks about kabbalah and Melanie Griffith's character says something like "Is that from California"? You were very prescient for predicting the rise of celebrity Kabbalah study.

Merry Christmas to all, and G-d bless us every one. And especially, G-d bless America.

"A sincere “Merry Christmas is better for you than the blandest, most guarded “Happy Holidays..."

Absolutely!

Moreover, if any 'adverbially modified' loony leftists insist on returning the greeting as Happy Holiday,
they should be asked if they would also say Happy Holiday to a Muslim who addressed them with the greeting of the Eid or other Muslim Festival.

It would be interesting to find out if the terms 'Mohammed' or 'Allah' are also on list of religious names not to be mentioned in the public schools, and if they were somehow 'overlooked',
( fantasy interlude )
Then maybe it should be brought to the attention of CAIR, so that they can either urge the schools to allow ALL religious names, or ask to schools to remove the Islamic religious terms too and if, for some unfathomable reason, CAIR is not prepared to do this, then to formally call the ACLU on it, and give them the same two choices
( / fantasy interlude )

For those of you who listen to NYC radio, please listen for this and confirm/deny/modify my following impression: The voice inflections of Edward Cardinal Egan of the NY Archdiocese and Rabbi Shmuel Butman of Lubavitch sound uncannily alike ;-)

Several comments:

I am so happy to read about saying "Merry Christmas", and "Beast's" essay was wonderful. I just dont' know how saying it ever could get twisted into thinking it would cause me harm, or make me want to convert or...? And it seems to be appreciated a lot by my coworkers today, (A Hindu doctor, the Jewish me, and everyone else some form of Christian!) as we slog through a rather insane day in the hospital where I work. I brought in nice (kosher) treats to share...peppermint bark, well appreciated...and I even got a "Hanukkah" card from an older volunteer. Ok, it was a "New Year" card with apples and honey (and he didn't know Hanukkah had already ended 3 weeks ago) but it really touched me. .

About Bethlehem, there was a depressing editorial in the Wall St. Journal by the editor of Newsweek, boohooing about the Christians AND Muslims in Bethlehem all suffering, specifically not because of the intafadas, but because of those evil "settlers". The article was morally reprehensible. Ironically, as he made it seem as if it were impossible to go to Bethlehem, that the tourism trade was completely dried up, the MSM today reports that there are more tourists there than in many years. The irony of the timing of the WSJ article and the REAL news is just striking. (And one of a number of reasons not to get Newsweek).

M:

So glad you enjoyed my film. And yeah, I did see the kooky Kabbalah craze coming——unfortunately.

Dr. Carol:

Merry Christmas to you and your lovely family. We're honored that you are a friend and regular reader and we look forward to meeting you face to face.

Exdem:

Great point! Chirp "Happy Holidays" to a Muslim during Ramadan and be prepared to have your head handed to you—literally.

Maurice:

The only Jews I know who get all weird and spun out of orbit about saying Merry Christmas are:

1. Some Hasidim.
2. Completely Hellenized Jews who worship Al Gore and daven to Global Warming 50 times a day. They get absolutely insane!

Newsweek is a jihadist-enabling magazine. Their enthusiasm for Hamas is second only to their enthusiasm for the end of Israel. Julius Streicher would marvel that such a publication is considered mainstream.

The WSJ article about Bethlehem was a series of lies. Even the punctuation was false. The only state in the Middle East where Chritians are free to practise Christianity is Israel.

The security wall prevents homicide bombers from killing innocent people. Period.

As a formerly Hellenized Jew, I cannot disagree with your characterization of the phenomenon. I’d like to append this, though:
Aversive Paranoia about giving offense to others is most powerful in those whose character is weakest and spiritual center is most hollow. It might well be called the Basil Fawlty Complex. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQR-q6RE5OI&feature=related
Thanks very much for the link.

Yaacov Ben Moshe:

Thanks so much for the comment and LOL the link! Yup, we needed that.

We have admired your blog for quite some time and shame on us for not linking to you earlier. Please keep up the fine work.

I love Fawlty Towers. Just so hilarious.

Re the Hebrew U "research" paper:

In his novel That Hideous Strength, C S Lewis imagined a sinister cult that put its initiates through a process aimed at killing "all specifically human reactions" in a person. It increasingly seems that higher education--at least higher education in the humanities and social sciences--seems to often have this aim, and this appears to be the case in all western societies.

See my post An Incident at the Movies.

David:

I've never read this CS Lewis novel. I will now. Your is just chilling, but all too typical. Thanks so much for writing it and bringing it to our attention. What a wake-up call.

Robert, if you do read That Hideous Strength, I'd be interested in your thoughts on whether it could work as a movie...it's always seemed to me that it could probably work very well.

David:

I'll let you know what I think.