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About Alli Marshall
Alli Marshall has lived in Asheville for more than 20 years and loves live music, visual art, fiction and friendly dogs. She is the winner of the 2016 Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize and the author of the novel "How to Talk to Rockstars," published by Logosophia Books. Follow me @alli_marshall

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8 thoughts on “It’s beginning to look a little like Christmas

  1. Piffy!

    [b]Don’t you mean xmas? please keep christ out of anything![b]

    Fun Fact: Actually, the ‘X’ in Xmas is related to an old way of writing ‘Christ’ in Greek. “Mass” is Latin. So the ‘X’ is in NO WAY a negation of ‘Christ’, whatsoever.

    Not that ‘anointed one’ was the guy’s name, anyway.

  2. T100C-1970

    In seems senseless to me for the City to continue to install and remove these plastic wreaths and lights in the name of some unnamed “holiday(s)”.

    Why not use this money to fill a pot hole or install a sewer?

    T100

  3. Susan Andrew

    @dpewen: By many accounts, Jesus of Nazareth had some fine ideas regarding human conduct; perhaps the behavior of some of his followers leaves something to be desired? Your comment reminds me of a quote attributed to Gandhi: something like, “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are not much like your Christ.”

    I like the greenery downtown, but it is interesting that the City of Asheville assumes the authority to hang these Christmas symbols (symbols that have Pagan origins, by the way). They do not hang Buddhist banners, or whatever other religious holiday markers that might represent people in our town. (They tax us, but do they attempt to represent us all?)

    It’s worth noting that not long ago, some sectors of the downtown association expressed interest in ridding the annual holiday parade of some non-Christian attire & symbolism that’s been evident in some participants’ floats. This could be seen as a little narrow-minded, since Asheville is a pretty diverse community. The true spirit of the thing may be revealed in the fact that the “holiday” parade is rather far-removed (on the calendar) from Dec. 25. I think the downtown association would admit that what the parade is really about is launching the holiday SHOPPING season…so it seems logical, from a marketing perspective, to keep EVERYONE in the mix. We’re all using the same legal tender, after all!

  4. Please don’t make dumb comments that seem to convey a belief that Christianity, the most dominant religion in America that is continually shoved down the throats of the American people, is in some sort of danger of being marginalized or disappearing.

  5. dpewen

    Matt, I will be having a blast at the xmas parade will you? We gather at Jack of the Wood and rag on the religious floats … big fun!

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