I heard the author on (I think) Talk of the Nation yesterday, and I found it really interesting that A Charlie Brown Christmas was almost universally approved for Jewish kids, given that it's the most undistilled, straight-from-the-New-Testament Jesus-y theme of all the kids' Christmas shows.

I think that that's what makes it approved, really. None of the stuff about "all the children" waiting for Santa, or anything like that. Christmas as a Christian holiday sits much more comfortably than Christmas as a secular holiday.

(And also, until high school or so, Charlie Brown Christmas and the Animaniacs Christmas Special were pretty much the only things I knew about the Nativity. And together, it gave me a relatively decent understanding. I didn't actually read the New Testament until a few years ago, when I was in Rome and getting very confused in art museums and figured I ought to find out what some of the paintings were about -- I understood the nativity and crucifixion ones, and a few of the others, but a whole lot that were just labeled with somebody's name, I had no idea who that person was, and there were all kinds of symbols that I just couldn't interpret.)

OK, how about the "Ferengi = space Jews" connection?

Don't most cultures have an "other" who are cheap?

I know the Scottish are supposed to be cheap. And the Dutch.

I just remembered that when I was growing up, I had a friend whose parents were devout Catholics and were thrilled to send her off to our house for Passover seder. It was all about learning old testament stuff, I realize now.

But her father was really pleased as punch that there was a Jewish family in the neighborhood, even as Jew-lite as we were.

It still seems a little odd to me.

My in-laws have delved more into religion as they've gotten older. I mean, they used to have a Christmas tree back when their kids were young (with visits from Hanukkah Hank), and Lewis was the only one of his siblings who had a bar/bat mitzvah and he's as secular as they get, overall. We often joke how funny it is that the nice, lapsed Catholic girl he married spent a semester of school in Israel while the nice lapsed Jewish boy I married has visited the Vatican.

Since we live in the same city as Lewis' parents, our kids get exposure to their Jewish side that way, with lighting the menorah and Friday night dinners and Seder while overall, we approach the Christian holidays from a secular bent. I suppose one of these days I'll take them to a Midnight Mass if they express any interest. I just want them to be good kids and be tolerant of everyone around them, more than adhere to any one particular religious ideology.

Our neighborhood was so white-bread Catholic/traditional Protestant that the "exotic" religious people were the Mormons who lived down the block. The few Jewish kids (mostly boys, now that I think about it) in school stood out when they had their bar mitzvahs and all of their (Catholic/Protestant) friends who attended the celebration would wear the yamalke they got to school the following Monday.

Mike Rowe was on Sesame Street this morning! It made me happy, anyway.

I also wonder why Emmett wants/needs a tux.

mr. flea has finally gone out to Christmas shop for me. As long as it's not perfume (which I don't wear)...

Trudy, she did blog it - apparently you are more likely to have a heart attack or stroke after a big meal, so you should never eat a big meal. @@

Our neighborhood was so white-bread Catholic/traditional Protestant that the "exotic" religious people were the Mormons who lived down the block.

We didn't have any Jews living in my home town that I knew of. (No African-Americans either.) Since I went to a private Protestant school, for us the "exotic" religious people were the Catholics. Confession seemed the weirdest thing to me. (My dad has an anti-Catholic bias that affected me as well.)

I also wonder why Emmett wants/needs a tux.

I just assumed it was that Emmett + tux = Awesome!