What is Christmas? Why do we celebrate it? Why do we decorate? Which controversies have followed it through the ages? What traditions have been lost? Over the coming weeks we will explore these and many more questions. It will not be a dry exploration. I intend to plumpen this probe with both holy and profane personal stories, tours, top 10 lists, and a deep inquiry into its meaning today for us, my dear readers of the OT.

I pray that as we embark on this journey, we will do so as a family who loves each of its constituent parts. This place is not for hatred or mockery or meanness. There is already enough of that in the world. Anyone can express their anger and sadness with malignity and malevolence. The way of nature -- the way of emotive translation directly into action -- is base and we are no better than animals when we follow it. Let us rise above that biochemical instinct to something greater. I pray too that the moderator(s) will not silence us and will encourage this ethereal wanderlust. When you take away my words of love, my affections for my brothers and sisters, you dismember me piece by piece. Removing a thread on my favorite 72 varieties of bread may seem like a small thing to you, but to me, you have taken from me a finger. I beseech you to let me be whole. Take not my arms. Take not my heart. Let my and their words live on. Let there be peace on the OT and let it begin with you. Hope is not abandoned on the OT. This place brims with it, for a light shines in the darkness and it shall not be overcome.

Dearest sisters and brothers, my invitation to you is communion. In the coming weeks I will share and open windows of my life that may explain how I think as I do. I will share memories and photos. It will be a personal journey I have never before taken. How much greater will this journey be if you share your memories as well.

The earliest Christians seemed not to care much about the birth of Christ. They believed the Second Coming was imminent. Several generations of Christians lived before celebrating the birth of Christ became widespread. By the late 200s, the Roman Christians decided to challenge directly the pagans by randomly assigning Christ’s birthday December 25, the same day as the public feast for Mithras, god of the sun. Shortly after, Constantine built the Vatican on the hill of Mithras worship. Christmas was becoming a political battle and the old god and festival of Saturnalia were out.

The masses, easily manipulated and influenced and caring more for feasts and merriments than truth, didn’t care all that much about in whose name the parties were thrown. Christmas spread throughout all of Europe, reaching England by 500. It wasn’t until 1050 that we see the first use of the term Christes maesse, meaning festival of the Christ.The festivals continued in England mostly unabated until Cromwell and the Puritans gained power.in the mid 1600s and tried to rid the nation of Christmas. Believe it or not, preachers were forbidden from preaching about the birth of Christ on Christmas, the day was struck from the list of holy days, and businesses were forced by government to stay open on the 25th.

I focus on the English at this time rather than the Eastern Church, the Egyptians, and the Yuletide loving Norwegians because America’s heritage comes from, above all peoples, the Puritans. They set in motion this great country of ours and whether you’re Italian, Ghanian, Chinese, or Russian, to live in America is to partake in this Puritan heritage. Try as you may, you will not escape it.

How did the Puritans arriving in America celebrate Christmas? Did they agree with Cromwell’s government and want to outlaw Christmas festivities? This will be for a forthcoming installment.

[INTERLUDE]

Do you know the story of Christopher Radko? No? I will tell you. Born of Bulgarian stock, his family yearly erected a beautiful Christmas tree filled with intricate glass ornaments. One night, the family tree fell down and with it hundreds of family heirlooms gone. He blamed himself because he had put the tree in a new stand. Gone were 2000 pieces of art.

The family went to the finest stores in New York, but there simply were no replacements. The tradition of beautiful ornaments worthy to be called art came to America from the eastern Europeans, especially Bulgaria and Poland in the late 1800s. The immigrants stuffed their suitcases with beautiful glass ornaments. The English brought their laws. The Italian their food. The Eastern Europeans, their Christmas ornaments.

As the Bolsheviks spread their anti-religion religion to the region, the ornament factories in Eastern Europe were shuttered. Americans, as a whole, preferred cheaper, less artistic ornaments, and by the time the Radko tree fell, the only places you would find hand blown and painted glass ornaments were auctions, antique stores, and estate sales.

Radko changed that. What initially began as an errand to his homelands became one of the most important industries of the 20th century. He brought back those factories and he reminded those Europeans of the beauty of art and the hope of Christmas. You may argue that it was Star Wars, Maggie Thatcher and Ronald Reagan that defeated the USSR; I disagree. I hold that it was indeed Radko, whose entry ignited the glass ornament renaissance in the Soviet Bloc, who, as much as any other individual, crushed communism. The unsung American hero who brought art to the Christmas tree and sent Stalinists packing sadly isn’t even a name most OT’ers know. Until now.

I started collecting Radko ornaments in the second grade and I don’t even remember how the obsession began. While school friends bragged about getting PlayStation games for Christmas, I boasted about my Oh Holy Night Christopher Radko ornament. Nothing was and is as smile producing on Christmas morning than seeing that beautiful orange and red Radko box under the tree. My collection now numbers 511. It is your Radko collection, not your family lineage, nor being able to say your dad was Comus, or that you are an Ivy League alumnus, that reveals oneself to others as a person of erudition and distinction, perhaps the only commercially available mark of refinement.

Today, my dearest of friends, I want to share with you my favorite 10 Christopher Radko ornaments on sale this year. If you are uncertain what to purchase for that special someone, regardless of age, interests, or politics, one of these ornaments is a failsafe choice.