X-mas just isn’t what
it used to be

Groups like the "Coalition for the Separation of X and State" have filed lawsuits to keep "X's" out of the public square. And with visible success. While in many public places this time of year you will see displays honoring Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Ramadan and, I believe, the Sacred Week of Curious Flatware, there are virtually no shrines, symbols or homemade plywood cutouts of obscure cartoon characters dedicated to the celebration of X-mas.

That's because, unlike other religious and cultural celebrations that take place at this time of year, X-mas doesn't enjoy a large legal defense budget that would allow it to challenge the blatant acts of discrimination against it. In fact, X-mas devotees have been so intimidated that you never see a gathering of more than three or four of them at a time.

IN THE OLD days, large groups of X-mas carolers, high on wine coolers, would roam through neighborhoods chanting long, arcane pronouncements issued by the Federal Department of Management and Budget. Malls would string banners across their doorways saying "Merry X-mas!" drawing hundreds of X-mas shoppers into their stores to buy traditional X-mas gifts like electric pencil sharpeners, generic bedspreads and clock radios.

No more. The X has all but disappeared from X-mas. A teacher who mentioned X-mas recently to her public school third-grade class was suspended on hazy Constitutional grounds. City officials denied a permit for an X-mas parade because they could not be seen to be endorsing one particular letter of the alphabet.

Just as well. I heard the X-mas "parade" consisted of a 1987 Yugo with a large X painted on its hood and a "marching band" of two slightly intoxicated accountants humming the sound track from "Born Free."

In this age of tolerance and season of giving, it's sad that X-mas adherents cannot find a seat at the holiday table, a pew in a nondenominational house of worship or kiosk at the mall. For myself, I wish a very Merry X-mas to all who celebrate it and, as Tiny Tim might have said if Charles Dickens worked for the ACLU: "X bless us every one."