Good morning and Merry Christmas, my friends! The time has come for my annual Christmas tradition of recounting the story of Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem.
As happens every Christmas, the Left is once against attempting to superimpose its hyper-woke, social justice spin on the nativity.
Actually, you can probably call it the Left’s annual Christmas tradition.
Joseph and Mary were homeless.
Joseph and Mary were illegal immigrants.
Joseph and Mary were migrants seeking a better life in Bethlehem.
Joseph and Mary were stuck in a stable because the poor are always mistreated by the privileged.
You name the social justice cause, and the Left will find a way to twist the Christmas story to fit it.
So in 2014, I began my own Christmas tradition as a counterpoint to this odious Christmas tradition of the Left.
And here it is:
Big Government: Inconveniencing Families for 2000 Years – December 10, 2014
During a town hall in Nashville, Barack Obama once again proved to the world that he knows absolutely nothing about the Bible (hat tip Breitbart). You see, Joseph and Mary, according to this noted theologian, were homeless wanderers forced to hole up in a stable.
If you have been a regular reader of mine, this particular theme will sound familiar because I touched on it last Christmas.
You know. The last time Barack Obama, Biblical Scholar declared that Mary and Joseph were illegal aliens who had no home in Bethlehem and had to live in the shadows of a stable.
Now, I’m probably not as knowledgeable a Biblical Scholar as Barack Obama.
You see, I only hold a measly Bachelor’s Degree in Biblical Studies.
However, permit me to provide Barack with some, oh, what’s the word, context.
Rome was a micromanaging, Big Government that loved to stick its nose into the lives of the people who lived under its rule.
Sound familiar?
Okay.
Moving on.
During the time of Caesar Augustus, when Quirinius was the Governor of Syria, Rome decreed that a census be performed. Now, the Roman Postal Service didn’t mail everyone a seventeen page form to find out how many people lived in your home, do you have health insurance, how many are gay, or what color your skin is.
Instead, they forced everyone to return to the city of their birth where they would be registered for the census.
So, if you lived in Nazareth, but were born in Bethlehem, you had to pack up your family and set out for Bethlehem in order to be counted in the Big Government Census.
Joseph, being from the House of David, was from Bethlehem.
So, despite the fact that his wife Mary was exceedingly pregnant, they had to pack a bag and make the trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem to be in compliance with the Roman census decree.
I’m sure some pencil-pushing hag named Loisius Lernerus was sitting in her office in Rome making sure that the Jews were super-inconvenienced by this census.
But that’s just conjecture on my part and in no way substantiated in the Bible.
Joseph and Mary were not relocating to Bethlehem.
Joseph and Mary were not sneaking into Bethlehem illegally so that Joseph could become an olive-picker in the fields while Mary made beds in Bethlehem’s one and only inn.
They were mandated by the Roman Government to haul their fannies to their city of birth in order to comply with a governmental decree.
And they weren’t the only ones having to do it.
Everyone who was born in Bethlehem, along with their families, were also making the trip.
Now, Bethlehem wasn’t Miami or Las Vegas. It wasn’t known for all of its ample tourist accommodations.
As a result, there was precious little room for all these people mandated by a government decree to return to Bethlehem and be counted in a Big Government Census.
Since accommodations were limited, and Joseph had himself an enormously pregnant wife, they found a place protected from the elements and slept there.
It happened to be a stable.
You see. Joseph and Mary were not illegal aliens. They were not migrants or refugees.
They were complying with a Big Government mandate.
If you want to take something away from the Christmas story about the circumstances that brought them to the stable, it should be:
Big Government: Inconveniencing Families for 2000 Years
Let’s face it. Had Rome not decreed this census be taken in the manner it was, Joseph and Mary would have welcomed their baby to the world from the comfort of their own home in Nazareth.
Obama wants to use the Christmas story as a lesson. Sadly, as is usually the case with Obama, he failed to get the right lesson.
They were not homeless people, but citizens inconvenienced in order to comply with a government mandate.
They were not illegal aliens, but citizens forced to take a trip at a difficult time in order to comply with a government mandate.
But, don’t be too hard on Obama.
If I had attended a church where the minister told his congregation that “G*d-Damn America” is in the Bible, I probably would be a little confused as well.
Of course, Obama also claimed in this same town hall that the Bible says, “Don’t throw stones in glass houses.”
Ah, yes. If I’m not mistaken, Solomon installed plenty of double-pane, energy-efficient windows when he built the Temple in Jerusalem. They went nicely with the solar panels on the roof. Turns out the reason Solomon was so wise was because he was Green Compliant.
The problem with trying to convince Christians to support Amnesty by misquoting the Bible is most of them probably know the Bible better than you do. They know that the Bible doesn’t say anything about glass houses since, well, you know, glass houses didn’t exist. And they know that Mary and Joseph were not homeless, illegal vagabonds who jumped the border into Bethlehem in order to get the Roman equivalent of Food Stamps.
Jesus isn’t a cat’s paw for you to pull out and utilize to promote your political agenda.
Truth is, Jesus wasn’t ever very keen on people abusing the religion of his “folks.”
Those who tried to profit from pilgrims by setting up booths within the Temple were promptly, and might I add, violently expelled by Jesus.
Stick to your strengths, Barack.
Quote the Koran.
Quote Rules for Radicals.
Quote the Communist Manifesto.
Jesus isn’t a political bludgeon. So, please. Leave the Bible alone.
~~~
I hope you enjoyed this annual Christmas tradition — even if you have read it every year since 2014.
Anyroad.
A very Merry Christmas to you and yours.
I want to thank those of you who made Christmas donations to PatriotRetort.com. They are deeply appreciated. Because even at this festive time of year, I still have bills to pay.
Speaking of traditions:
Tomorrow begins PatriotRetort.com’s End of Year Fundraiser. I know times are tight for all of us. But I hope you are able to make a contribution to keep PatriotRetort.com going in 2021.
Be on the lookout next Thursday for another annual tradition here at PatriotRetort.com – namely Dianny’s Ten Most Tiresome People of the year.
I wish you all the compliments of the season!