Wednesday, December 17, 2008

The War On Christmas

Every year in the United States the War on Christmas springs up.

This post is not about that war.

Instead, I am going to talk about an older version of this war.

In 1829, Thomas Massey-Massey of the English House of Commons proposed a bill to ban the use of the word Christmas. He argued that Christmas was a combination of the words Christ and Mass, and since England was a fiercely Protestant country, the name of the holiday should be changed to Christ-tide.

Daniel O'Connell, a member of the opposition, stood up and replied, " The Irish contingent would have no difficulty with the proposed change of Christmas to Christ-tide, provided that the Honorable Thomas Massey-Massey would be willing to change his name to Thotide Tidey-Tidey."

The resulting uporarious laughter laughter killed the bill.

Merry Christ...tide, everyone!

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