“All I Want for Christmas Is to Skip Church!”

Often around Christmas, atheist groups put up billboards encouraging people to reject the real reason for Christmas—Christ! And they’re doing it again this year. Note that their focus is to be against the Christian message. Such efforts once again help show that this is a spiritual issue, as secularists actively try to “suppress the truth in unrighteousness” (Romans 1).

The 2014 billboards feature a young girl writing a letter to Santa Claus and saying, “Dear Santa, All I want for Christmas is to skip church! I’m too old for fairy tales.”

According to the American Atheists’ article, these billboards, instead of placing them in the usual urban areas such as Times Square in New York City, are going to be displayed “in more residential areas to be near schools and churches.”

Sadly, both the theme and the location of the billboards show that American Atheists is desperately working to influence our children with its religion of purposelessness and meaninglessness.

Those Who Claim Tolerance Are Most Intolerant

Atheists (like Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss, for instance) accuse Christians of a form of “child abuse” because we are teaching our children the Christian message, including the Genesis creation account. But it’s the atheists who are destroying children’s lives by trying to force their anti-God, meaningless religion on generations of kids. People need to understand that atheists are not trying to stop children from being taught religion—they just don’t want them being taught the Christian religion, because they want to impose their own atheist religion on them. This clearly shows that those who often loudly claim tolerance are, as I have written many times, the most intolerant people around!

American Atheists’ president said, “Even children know churches spew absurdity, which is why they don’t want to attend services. Enjoy the time with your family and friends instead . . . Today’s adults have no obligation to pretend to believe the lies their parents believed. It’s OK to admit that your parents were wrong about God, and it’s definitely OK to tell your children the truth.”

Instead of encouraging children to seek truth and parents to teach truth, these billboards are essentially encouraging kids and parents to walk down the broad path that leads to destruction (Matthew 7:13). Yes—these atheists are vehemently suppressing the truth about God that they actually know because of their unrighteousness (Romans 1:18–19)—and they are determined that our kids do the same! This billboard also implies that children should rebel against their Christ-following parents. I wrote recently about comments from President Obama that had the same basic message of rebelling against the previous generation. I see more and more of an emphasis from the intolerant secularists to give up the worldview of their parents (particularly the Christian worldview) and “do what is right in their own eyes” (Judges 21:25).

The Irony

Ironically, these billboards are pressuring kids to skip church because they’re “too old for fairytales,” but they seem to have no problem with kids writing letters to Santa Claus, an obviously mythical character. Even an atheist blogger commented on the irony when he wrote, “If the girl is too old for fairy tales, then why is she writing to Santa Claus . . . ?” He also noted, “And does it really makes [sic] sense for a budding atheist to be celebrating Christmas?” It doesn’t! After all, Christmas is a holiday set aside to remember Christ coming to Earth for us!*

Ultimately, why do atheists care what our children, or their parents, believe? After all, if there really is no God and death is the absolute end, why does it even matter what anyone believed during their time on Earth? According to atheism, once you die, that’s it—it’s over. What a hopeless, purposeless message! But the message of Christ offers real hope and purpose. Jesus Christ came to Earth, lived a perfect life, and died on the Cross to take the penalty of death that we deserve because of our sin upon Himself. Three days later He rose again and now offers eternal life! The message of the Bible is a message of hope, and it is truth.

The Attack on AiG

Now, atheists like those in this group displaying these billboards have tried to stop the Creation Museum and now are attacking the Ark Encounter project. These atheists are completely intolerant of the Christian religion in the culture and supposedly in the name of tolerance and freedom of speech, are trying to outlaw Christianity and are making their anti-God religion the state religion!

That’s why it’s so important for us to teach our children to defend their faith against the attacks of a hostile culture. We need to give them solid, biblically based answers to the skeptical questions of the world. We need to teach them to trust God’s Word, from the beginning. God’s Word is not “fairy tales”—it is truth! And observational science confirms the Word of God. And because the history of the Bible is true, the message of the gospel is true. This is the message we need to teach this generation!

I also want to challenge Christian leaders. The atheists are very active in their opposition to Christianity—increasingly aggressive. We need more and more godly leaders to step up to the plate and boldly and publicly stand on God’s Word. We need more Christian leaders to stand publicly with Answers in Genesis, the Creation Museum, and the Ark Encounter! The atheists are aggressively attacking a God-honoring organization that is involved in building one of the greatest evangelistic outreaches of our time: the Ark Encounter. I urge more of God’s people to stand with us.

Thanks for stopping by and thanks for praying,

Ken

 

This item was written with the assistance of AiG's research team.

*In the editing process of this blog post, a line was inadvertently removed and has since been corrected by one of our editors.