My Daughter Comes to My Defense

I need to share how blessed I am.

Last week my local paper, the Eugene Register-Guard, published an opinion piece decrying the illusory “War On Christmas” that (without any prompting) I had submitted to them. Since then, I have received numerous letters, emails, and blog comments, almost all complimentary beyond my deserving, a few critical, and some just baffling (one gentleman keeps mailing me envelopes full of sheets of Bible verses, which I appreciate as showing a kindly concern for the state of my soul).

Today, I received the following letter from a critic:

Dec. 19, 2005

To Mr. Bellows, “Christian”

I feel compelled to point out just a few fallacies in your newspaper article ‘The Truth About Christmas.’

First of all, there isn’t much truth to your article and it’s obvious you live in your own liberal bubble as they all do at the Register Guard. How quaint they found a ‘Christian’ they could use to propogate their secularist, close minded and predictable opinions. You pointed out that the Register Guard actually prints a ‘one size fits all’ religious article called ‘Heart to Heart.’ Big wow! You gotta be kidding. Most newspapers in this country have full two page articles regarding religion.

Like all liberals, you also have a big time problem with Bill O’Reilly. Tsk. Tsk. You headlined “O’Reilly promotes commercialization.’ Yeah. Right. You do an excellent job of twisting and manipulating what O’Reilly has said to your [sic] fit your own needs and opinions. Is that all yo can come up with? Let’s see. Who am I going to agree with – a small town, very provincial, clueless ‘Christian’ or O’Reilly who happens to have the NUMBER ONE highest rated, cable program on TV and has had for 5 years running now. More people are watching and listening to him than all the other news shows combined. If you go by your articles, you didn’t even know he was on TV. All O’Reilly wanted was for people to have the freedom of expression to wish people a Merry Christmas if they chose to do so.

There is a war against Christians in this country and there is a war against Christmas. I have lived in may different parts of this country. No where have I seen such Christian intolerance that exists in the sol called open minded, diversity tolerant town of Eugene. One excellent example is how the city council drove their own hospital out of town just because it is a Catholic Hospital. Now the city council is bending over backwards to place a for profit hospital ANYWHERE in this city. As a neighbor recently told me, ‘We’re lucky they’re not shooting Christians in this town.’ ----- Not yet.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Kimberly DeChoates

My wife, whose birthday it is and who was in a festive and amused mood, read that letter aloud to the family after dinner over decaf and port. My eleven year old daughter Elizabeth was offended and decided to come to my defense; she penned the following response:

Dear Ms. DeChoates,

My Dad is very informed on what is going on in the world, thank you very much, and he keeps me informed on everything. I am writing this on my own free will, my Dad is not the type of person to force something on anybody. Yes he is a liberal, and so is my mother, they are very proud of it.

My IQ is120, and so I am very smart and I know when somebody is being rude and inconsiderate. I am angry with you for disrespecting my family, and Madam, although I am only eleven, I am appalled with your behavior.

Merry Christmas is not suitable for this time of year, because there is also New Year, Kwanza,, Hanuka, and also Solstice. I also noticed that you used it almost like a curse. Tsk, tsk.

Happy Holidays, Kimberly.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Bellows
Age 11
Liberal Young Lady

Elizabeth is such a good child that she asked my permission to mail it. Since it meets our family’s standards for children’s conduct toward adults – honestly sharing her opinions and beliefs while showing the respect we require they show every adult – I told her she was welcome to send it. It'll be in tomorrow's mail, hand-addressed by her.

And I feel blessed, blessed, blessed. My daughters have been practicing all day on the new used piano that Santa brought us. I just finished an excellent dinner to celebrate my loving and lovely wife’s 51st birthday, am listening to Erroll Garner, Eva Cassidy and Laurindo Almeida in rotation on the stereo, and have lively and intelligent daughters who are quick and articulate in coming to my defense. What more can a man ask?

Thank you, God, whoever you are. You are very, very good to me.

Happy HannuSolstiKwanzaMas, everyone.

Thersites