Advent Conspiracy

Have you heard yet of the Advent Conspiracy?  I hadn't until I started seeing the articles on Google Trends and Yahoo! News.  In some ways, I think these people have the right idea.  Let me tell you a little more about it.

Everyone knows that there are people every year that scream about how the cashiers in the stores have gone to saying "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas."  There are those who feel that it is wrong that everyone is taking the "Christ out of Christmas."  Season's Greetings are replacing Merry Christmas on cards and in stores everywhere.  This is not a new argument.

However, those in the Advent Conspiracy go a little bit further.  These in the Advent Conspiracy movement are not surprised that stores are taking the "Christ out of Christmas."  They feel that it isn't the store's job to tell the story of Christ in the manger.  Leave that to the Christians, they would say.

The biggest concerns of those of the Advent Conspiracy is the commercialization of Christmas.  Hundreds of churches on four continents and 17 different countries have signed up to do Christmas a little bit differently.  They have spent less on each other during Christmas instead donating the money to worthy causes.  For example, in the past four years, they have donated millions of dollars to dig wells in developing countries.

The people and churches in the Advent Conspiracy movement advocate how much we could do with a fraction of the money that people spend at the retail shops during the month of December.

For some, this idea of not giving gifts at Christmas is too radical.  For my part, I believe that they have the right idea.  Christmas isn't about the gifts.  It's not about how much you can spend on each other.  It's not about how big of a present you can buy.  It's about people.  It's about the birth of Jesus Christ.  I'm all for those in the Advent Conspiracy Movement!