Holy Crap: Starbucks and Jesus
Okay, so here’s the deal. A bunch of Super DeLux Brand Christians are all martyred-out over Starbuck’s holiday cups.
In the past, Starbucks has always had a holiday cup. It generally had holly, snowflakes, a winter scene, or a generic ornament.
Just for pure meanness, the folks at Starbucks went minimalist this year with a plain red cup. No snowflakes. No holly. No kidding.
Apparently, Jesus approved of the cup design in years past, but now he doesn’t. In fact, he’s telling his posse to tell the Starbuck’s people that their name is Merry Christmas, forcing those overpaid baristas to write Merry Christmas on the cups so that they meet Jesus Standards of Control. Jesus is very passive aggressive.
I, myself am wondering why snowflakes signify Jesus. I am also wondering why Jesus gets pissed off at anything that doesn’t make him the center of attention. But mostly, I am wondering why Super DeLux Brand Christians want to reduce Jesus to cardboard coffee cups.
With all the Merry Christmas people taking to Twitter to express their outrage over Starbucks punishing them for their love of Jesus, one person found a handle on truth and decided to wave it around.
Amen.
Thanks to Bubba for the heads up.
Amen, indeed! I may have to run over to Starbuck’s now for a Pumpkin Spice Latte, although I hadn’t even considered it until just this moment. Are the kristians going to boycott?
1Amen, indeed! LOL
2The nutjobs don’t have enough to occupy their empty lives if this is what passes for KKKristmas spirit.
3I generally avoid Starbuck’s in favor of independent shops, but I’ll make an effort for the cause just to irritate Faux Xtians.
Luckily, I can shop for some groceries at the same time.
(“TFP”–for a definition, see Jim Wright’s FB page.)
4My kid is a Starbucks barista.
He is also an atheist.
Having known him for almost 23 years (his birthday is Christmas Eve btw), I’ll bet a triple grande three pump mocha he’ll be writing “Jésus is born” on the cup of any fool who mentions this to him.
5Ugh! Jesus was born in the Spring after the Passover holiday. The evidence is clear. So I think we should all celebrate the birth of SomedayGirl’s son in this day since we know for a fact the day of his birth.
He should write, “Happy Birthday to me” on all the cups.
6Interesting how some of those engaged in defending the ‘War on Christmas’ have such an attachment on the Holiday. As many of you know, I am a lapsed member of the Tribe. But as a young man about to complete my religious studies, I was never offended by either a greeting of “Happy Holidays” or “Merry Christmas.” It was what it was, an expression by another person in an attempt to spread cheer and as such graciously accepted and returned.
I’ll miss those white snowflakes on a red Starbuck’s cup, as a sign of the season, Winter Solstice to many. I’ll not ask any harried barrister to endorse my cup. But in the spirit of all holidays, probably tip a little extra to those working hard that day and in need of a little cheer themselves.
7I’m in Hawaii.
8We do Christmas without snowflakes too.
It works.
So what exactly is Christian about Christmas? Manger scenes, some of the music, and going to church. Everything else was stolen or cobbled from various Pagan traditions of winter solstice, including the fact that it’s in December at all. So if they’re demanding their rights to snow, evergreen trees, holly, mistletoe, wreaths, candles, gifts, family get-togethers, big dinners, Yule logs, and the other half of the music, and they claim that all *that* is Christian, they’re full of reindeer poop.
I cannot tell you how sick I get of the “Christian” tradition of “Oh poor us, we’re so oppressed.” If you’re doing Christianity loudly in public, you’re doing it wrong, and Jesus would have told you so (see Matthew 6: 5-6).
9PS: the Puritans knew all that, which is why they outlawed the celebration of Christmas.
10I encourage any barista presented with such a customer to call out “Mary?! Mary X! Your venti double mocha latte with a triple peppermint shot is ready. Mary?”
11I can just picture all those “christians” telling the barista their name is merry christmas and when it’s called out half a dozen of them step up at once and fight over whose latte it is. Talk about “christmas spirit”. Idiots. I’m sure Jesus is so happy to be associated with throwaway cardboard coffee cups.
12How about they pass out a little wafer with every cup? will that keep those wingnuts happy?
13Christmas is one day in the year. Its extension (protrusion?) into other days, weeks and months is about merchandising, not Christmas. There is no religious requirement for a paper or styrofoam cup to celebrate Christmas on a day that is not Christmas. And Starbucks is probably closed on Christmas.
If I should happen to stray into a Starbucks anytime soon I guess I’ll tell the barista that my name is “Bah Humbug.”
14Rhea: we’re not going to get too far if you keep employing logic. (I like your logic but, y’know… them.) And just by-the-by, who decided red was the color of Christmas?
15I continually wonder about the smarts of these people.
They need the ten commandments everywhere on government property, and even then they can’t remember not to lie, cheat, steal and tango with another person’s spouse.
And Good Lord, how are they to remember it is the Lord’s birthday without a reindeer cup?
16The holly and the ivy,
17The running of the deer,
The night is long,
Come join our song
At the turning of the year.
Poor, empty headed whatever they are cuz they just don’t behave actually xtian! My son tried very hard to get a job as a barista and he can’t stand coffee but he was positive he could meet a lot of pretty girls. May the above referenced people take that and shove it into their xmas stocking! (Did he make the cut? No, as I said he can’t abide coffee.)
18It’s never enough for the Christmas complainers. As an elementary public school music teacher, I was expected to present several choral concerts per year and one was in December. I tried my best to keep the music I chose as secular as possible due to the fact that children of many faiths attended.
19I dreaded the comments and arguments I got from parents and grandparents who wanted to hear Christmas Hymns, but I patiently explained the concepts of a PUBLIC school and freedom of religion to the same people year after year. ( I got both barrels from Jewish parents for having them sing Jingle Bells) Until one year, when a mother called and told me that she and her minister had made up a list of hymns which they expected me to teach my students. That’s the one time I hung up on a parent in order to avoid saying something that I would forever regret. Luckily the principal was 100% in agreement with me.
I’m boycotting Starbucks until they give us a choice of a nice, blue, Democratic throwaway cardboad cup.
20Festivus for the Rest of us. Seriously Christians do not own December and you know what? I’m sticking with my tribe; 8 nights baby, 8 nights of gift giving and eating little chocolate coins.
Buddhism
Bodhi Day: 8 December – Day of Enlightenment, celebrating the day that the historical Buddha (Shakyamuni or Siddhartha Gautama) experienced enlightenment (also known as Bodhi).
Fictional or parody
Feast of Winter Veil: 15 December–2 January – A holiday in World of Warcraft. This holiday is based on Christmas. Cities are decorated with lights and a tree with presents. Special quests, items and snowballs are available to players during this time. The character of “Greatfather Winter”, who is modeled after Santa Claus, appears.[12][13]
Feast of Alvis: in the TV series Sealab 2021.[14] “Believer, you have forgotten the true meaning of Alvis Day. Neither is it ham, nor pomp. Nay, the true meaning of Alvis day is drinking. Drinking and revenge.”–Alvis[15]
Hogswatch: a holiday celebrated on the fictional world of Discworld. It is very similar to the Christian celebration of Christmas.
Festivus: 23 December – a parody holiday created by Daniel O’Keefe and made popular by Seinfeld as an alternative to Christmas.
Decemberween: 25 December – a parody of Christmas that features gift-giving, carol-singing and decorated trees. The fact that it takes place on December 25, the same day as Christmas, has been presented as just a coincidence, and it has been stated that Decemberween traditionally takes place “55 days after Halloween”. The holiday has been featured in the Homestar Runner series.
Wintersday, the end-of-the-year celebration in the fictional universe of the Guild Wars franchise, starts every year mid December and ends the next year on early January.
Hinduism
Pancha Ganapati: 21–25 December – modern five-day festival in honor of Lord Ganesha, celebrated by Hindus in USA.
Historical
Malkh: 25 December
Mōdraniht: or Mothers’ Night, the Saxon winter solstice festival.
Saturnalia: the Roman winter solstice festival
Dies Natalis Solis Invicti (Day of the birth of the Unconquered Sun): 25 December – late Roman Empire
Judaism
Hanukkah: Ḥănukkāh, usually spelled חנוכה, pronounced [χanuˈka] in Modern Hebrew; a transliteration also romanized as Chanukah or Chanukkah), also known as the Festival of Lights, Feast of Dedication, is an eight-day Jewish holiday commemorating the re-dedication of the Holy Temple (the Second Temple) in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire of the 2nd century BC. Hanukkah is observed for eight nights and days, starting on the 25th day of Kislev according to the Hebrew calendar, which may occur at any time from late November to late December in the Gregorian calendar.
Paganism
Yule: Pagan winter festival that was celebrated by the historical Germanic people from late December to early January.
Yalda: 21 December – The turning point, Winter Solstice. As the longest night of the year and the beginning of the lengthening of days, Shabe Yaldā or Shabe Chelle is an Iranian festival celebrating the victory of light and goodness over darkness and evil. Shabe yalda means ‘birthday eve.’ According to Persian mythology, Mithra was born at dawn on 22 December to a virgin mother. He symbolizes light, truth, goodness, strength, and friendship. Herodotus reports that this was the most important holiday of the year for contemporary Persians. In modern times Persians celebrate Yalda by staying up late or all night, a practice known as Shab Chera meaning ‘night gazing’. Fruits and nuts are eaten, especially pomegranates and watermelons, whose red color invokes the crimson hues of dawn and symbolize Mithra.
Secular
Human Rights Day: 10 December
Zamenhof Day: 15 December – Birthday of Ludwig Zamenhof, inventor of Esperanto; holiday reunion for
Esperantists
21Soyal: 21 December – Zuni and Hopi
HumanLight: 23 December – Humanist holiday originated by the New Jersey Humanist Network in celebration of “a Humanist’s vision of a good future.”[16]
Newtonmas: 25 December – As an alternative to celebrating the religious holiday Christmas, some atheists and skeptics have chosen to celebrate December 25 as Newtonmas, due to it being Isaac Newton’s birthday on the old style date.
Quaid-e-Azam’s Day: 25 December
Boxing Day: 26 December – Day after Christmas.
Kwanzaa: 26 December–1 January – Pan-African festival celebrated in the US
Watch Night: 31 December
New Year’s Eve: 31 December – last day of the Gregorian year
Hogmanay: night of 31 December–before dawn of 1 January – Scottish New Year’s Eve celebration
Dongzhi Festival – a celebration of Winter
Unitarian Universalism
Chalica: first week of December – A holiday created in 2005, celebrated by some Unitarian Universalists.[17]
I don’t do Starbucks. I brew my chocolate/raspberry decaf at home.
And, after more years than I care to mention, that I have “done” Christmas, this year I refuse to wear myself out doing Christmas.
Christmas is for children… who still believe in Santa Claus. JMHO.
22I bet the nuts don’t realize that red=republicans 🙁 all that free advertising being wasted.
23I cannot stand those sugar drinks they sell, but if I had the address of one of those Super Delux brand Xtians I’d start drinking stuff from Starbucks… just so I could send my trash coffe cup that in their minds stands for Christ to them.
24http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-pavlovitz/dear-christians-shouting-starbucks-is-not-helping_b_8510244.html
25Sharon, a job well done……….thanks.
26Wow!, epo, John Pavlovitz sure has a way with words:
27Describing what in your face Christianity has become,
“…faith-justified antagonism and fight-picking…” and the War on Christmas crowd as “…terminally persecuted malcontents always looking for a good fight…”
Well said!
So, we should all go to Starbuck’s, and give names like Satan and Beelzebub for our orders. Or, better yet, Mohammad.
28Endless possibilities: Kwanza Chanukkah
I will ask for Mrs. Festivus. It really doesn’t amaze me that the small minded talibangelicals can focus on an undecorated disposable coffee cup as War on Christmas. Every decent hyper christian knows that the Spirit of Christmas is embodied in hokey songs, family fights, snowflakes, flying reindeer, and getting killed in a crush at a WalMart opening the day after Thanksgiving.
29I don’t remember if I had posted this here, but I had my “epiphany” about Christmas when my sons were small and absolute terrible trolls on Christmas morning. I called my mother and cried, “why can’t Christmas be as wonderful as it was when I was a child?” There was a brief silence and then she said, “every Christmas, I wanted to kill you children.”
30Linda Phipps wins the story of the year! Dang,that is funny. 🙂
31Besides all the chatty conversation, I really hate the taste of their coffee, it is so bitter and much too pricey! Yuk!
32Maybe Starbucks is celebrating Zappadan. It does run from December 4-21.
A church could do a pop up coffee shop for December. How many “volunteers” could they get to keep the place staffed? Of course the other “Christians” would be asking for discounts and freebies. Would Jesus approve of coffee?
33Want to follow Jesus? Feed, clothe, and house the poor. Help them find work, perhaps. Who gives a crap about communist-colored coffee cups?
34If the three wise men fed their camels coffee,no one would have ever heard of Bethlehem. They’d be talking about ways to slow the damn camels down. I got an idea,put a wingnut governor on them.
35Yeah Zyxomma. Thanks, everyone. Sometimes you gotta wonder. I figure they changed the cups because their computer broke and they decided just to go with plain red. Or it’s cheaper to have red cups.
36Keeping Christ in Christmas is not about red cups without snowflakes as some fools and their followers would have you believe. Keeping Christ in Christmas is not about putting up a Christmas tree. Keeping Christ in Christmas is not about how many lights you have on your house. It is not even about how many gifts you can buy for your children, or loved ones. Saying Merry Christmas does not in the least put Christ back into Christmas, it is saying Merry Christmas in the hope that someone will recognize you as standing out in a crowd, or a blithering idiot because the person you are saying it to is not a Christian. People not believing the same way you believe, and you want to force them to, is not keeping Christ in Christmas.
37What is it then? You need not mention the name “Christ” to keep Him in Christmas. You need not toot your own religion to keep Christ in Christmas. If you are a Christian, then follow the tenets of your religion, be a good person, love you neighbor, help the poor, heal the sick. If you are not a Christian, be a good person, help your neighbor, heal the sick, comfort the afflicted, feed the poor. That is keeping Christ in Christmas without even mentioning His name.
Christ Himself said, if you pray, go into a room and pray privately, not like the Pharisees who pray loudly in public, but do nothing for anyone except make a loud noise for everyone to hear.
Preaching, posting, boasting, writing to raise the ire of someone against something such as the great red cup is not keeping Christ in Christmas, rather, it is wasting energy that could be spent doing the actual teaching of Christ.
What Bernard said.
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