Last week we received a note from a listener concerned with the pagan roots of the Christmas holiday. It's something you hear a lot this time of year, that Christians "borrowed lumber" from pagans to build the traditions of Christmas.

Often, critics point to things like the Christmas tree, the alignment of Jesus' birth with the Egyptian God Horus, and the Christian culture war against the practice of Saturnalia. A lot of these arguments gained traction in a documentary called Religulous by liberal critic Bill Maher.

To address this and many questions, Shane Morris invited Dr. Glenn Sunshine to the Upstream podcast. The two unpack the historical roots of the church embracing December 25th for the Christmas holiday. They talk about what it means to "spoil the Egyptians," as St. Augustine put it. They also lay a Christian worldview foundation for the celebration of Christmas.

Listen to this deep dive into the Christmas holiday on Shane's Podcast, Upstream, or you can watch our What Would You Say? Video, "Is Christmas a Pagan Holiday."

Christians have so many wonderful resources that can help us celebrate Christ's birth and prepare our hearts for His second coming, and one of them is sacred music. The abundant supply of truly majestic Christmas music points to a long line of theological artists, individuals who took seriously both what truth needed to be said in music and how it could be said so as to be both memorable and beautiful. Perhaps the greatest offering of all is Johann Sebastian Bach's Christmas Oratorio.

For much of his life, Bach was in charge of music at St. Thomas Lutheran Church in Leipzig, Germany. However, his many other responsibilities, such as raising 20 children, might explain why he indulged in a few shortcuts. For example, Bach often recycled old material for new musical pieces.

Of course, true creativity does not always require an artist to work from scratch. We are made in the image of the God, who created ex nihilo, out of nothing, but human creativity always, to some degree, involves cultivating what God has given us and developing it to its highest form. In the Christmas Oratorio, Bach took virtually every solo from sacred music he had composed earlier and combined them with other choruses and instrumentals that were both new and old.

The opening chorus, "Celebrate, rejoice, rise up and… glorify what the Highest has done today," was completely original. Later in the oratorio, Bach invites us to contemplate the paradox of the Incarnation: that the King of heaven saw fit to become a tiny baby born in a stable. By means of a powerful bass, Bach marvels that, "Great Lord, O powerful King, dearest Savior. . . He who sustains the entire world, who created its magnificence and beauty, must sleep in a harsh manger."

Bach's original lyrics are in German. Come to BreakPoint.org, for a link to the entire English translation.

Bach's notion of creativity has been largely lost today. As children of 19th century Romanticism, many contemporary artists focus on the self as the creator and see the role of the artist to spin out something completely novel and unique. Most artists today equate creativity with novelty, some even think that the role of art is to be subversive to any and all norms. It's a form of what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery."

Bach's music is as a powerful reproach to that vision of what art is. He saw creativity as a means of highlighting and enhancing traditional Christian belief. He saw that scriptural texts and musical forms were compatible, serving each other in order to supply rich liturgy.

Bach signed all his work "SDG," shorthand for Soli Dei Gloria, which means "to God alone the Glory." Bach knew the One true source of human creativity and that He must work through the composer if the art is to be what it should.

This Christmas, let one of history's greatest artists, remind you that all of our work should be done to the glory of God. Like Bach, our creativity is intended to serve the Creator, who is the source of our lives and our abilities.

Last week, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced an investigation into two big pharmaceutical companies profiting from pushing off-label hormone treatment for gender dysphoric kids.

In a public statement, Paxton accused these companies of failing to warn about the devastating side effects of the medications, including sterility. The fact is, the hormone suppressing medications being prescribed by so-called "gender clinics" are not approved by the FDA to treat gender dysphoria. They are only FDA-approved for diagnosable physical medical conditions like premature puberty and prostate cancer.

Paxton is right: these companies should be held accountable, as should medical professionals who cave to social pressure and prescribe medications for the wrong use.

And, if nothing else, Paxton is sending a critical message: that gender dysphoria is a mental condition, not a physical one like malaria or the flu. If more public officials and medical professionals would emulate Paxton's courage, many hearts, minds, and lives could be saved.

At the risk of falling into the current debate over whether Christians should tone down the violent language and imagery when it comes to their faith, the Bible presents the Incarnation as an act of War. In fact, the Bible presents the Incarnation as the central chapter in the larger story of the conflict between good and evil; one never fully lost by God but captured in Christ Jesus. That's something missing from the 24-hour holiday music stations, most Christmas plays and pageants, and many Christmas Eve sermons.

Still, there is a source that continues to confront our culture with the whole story, with some of the finest Christian teaching ever produced by redeemed Image Bearers. Christmas offers us the amazing opportunity to not only immerse ourselves with deep Christian truth, but also present it to others.

Of course I'm talking about Christmas carols. Carols provide us a level of incredible clarity and depth, that is so rare. As an example, consider the "Wexford Carol."

Good people all, this Christmas time, Consider well and bear in mind What our good God for us has done In sending his beloved son With Mary holy we should pray, To God with love this Christmas Day In Bethlehem upon that morn, There was a blessed Messiah born

You get a sense of the rescue mission that was the Incarnation in the traditional English carol, "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen."

God rest ye merry gentlemen Let nothing you dismay Remember Christ our Savior Was born on Christmas Day To save us all from Satan's pow'r When we were gone astray Oh tidings of comfort and joy Comfort and joy Oh tidings of comfort and joy

And in the haunting beauty of "O Come, O Come Emmanuel," the coming of Christ is presented in the context of God's Old Testament promises.

O come, O come, Thou Lord of Might, Who to Thy tribes, on Sinai's height, In ancient times didst give the law, In cloud, and majesty, and awe.

O come, Thou Rod of Jesse, free Thine own from Satan's tyranny; From depths of hell Thy people save And give them victory o'er the grave.

And few hymns offer a Christology as rich as "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing," which, if Wikipedia is to be believed, is the brainchild not only of the great hymn-writer Charles Wesley but also, in part, the great revivalist, George Whitefield.

Veiled in flesh, the Godhead see, hail the incarnate deity Pleased as man with men to dwell, Jesus, our Immanuel Pleased as man with men to dwell, Jesus, our Immanuel

Hail the heaven born Prince of Peace, hail the sun of Righteousness Light life to all he brings, ris'n healing in his wings Christ the highest heaven adored, Christ the everlasting Lord Come desire of nations come, fix in us thy humble home Come desire of nations come, fix in us thy humble home

We could go on, but finally in "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day," we are offered hope in how this cosmic battle will eventually turn out.

And in despair I bowed my head: "There is no peace on earth," I said, "For hate is strong and mocks the song Of Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: "God is not dead, nor doth he sleep, The wrong shall fail, the right prevail, With peace on earth, good will to men"peace on earth, good will to men"

Till, ringing singing, on its way, The world revolved from night to day, A voice, a chime, a chant sublime, Of peace on earth, good will to men!

In these songs, sung by my friend Josh Bales, we have the fullness of the Christian story: a world that belongs to God, our lost plight due to sin, our captivity to Satan's schemes, the working of God through the ages, His promises revealed in the long path of redemption that God worked through the Patriarchs, through prophets and kings, and through promises given so long ago; the wonders of the Incarnation, the fear and hope of Mary and Joseph, and the realization and glory of angelic hosts proclaiming their king, and ours.

Each year in these hymns, and others, we are reminded that God did not leave us in our sins but came down and lived among us that He might die for us. We have in these songs the whole gospel of God.

As comforting and instructive as they are to our own hearts, at what other time of the year do our disinterested friends, neighbors, and family members find themselves humming along with theology? What greater opportunity will we have to share the Faith than when our listeners are already hearing its truths every day?

As a colleague once observed to me, this is our moment to echo the work of Philip with the Ethiopian. The world around us knows their need. They hide it well, under vain pleasures and false narratives, but they also know that things are not quite right. What they need is someone to explain to them how things might be made right in Christ Jesus.

Let's take this opportunity, singing our way through Christmas, to share the joy that has been given to us that this joy may spread to others.

John and Shane are asked if there should be a Christian approach to boycotting. They are then asked about the unity Evangelicals and Catholics can have while still being true to their convictions. Another listener writes in to ask how to think well of a liberalizing in her field of psychology. To close, John and Shane discuss a commentary on the rise in opioid deaths in America and how the church can and should respond.

Two months ago, Apple quietly removed a Quran app and a Bible App from its app store in China at the request of the Chinese Communist Party. Apple claimed in a statement they had to do it because they have to, quote, "obey local laws."

This is the same 2.8-trillion-dollar company with an "Inclusion and Diversity" initiative that claims, without a sense of irony, to hold a, quote, "long-standing commitment to making… the world more just." According to its American website, that means hiring a more racially diverse group of employees. That's great. It's unclear how that helps the 1.4 billion people living under increasing religious oppression in China.

This is a good reminder. When companies like Apple throw around the word "inclusive," it's because they see a profit opportunity. When companies like Apple are happily complicit in outright oppression, it's because they won't risk a profit opportunity. If the day comes when American culture gives Apple an ultimatum: either nix the Bible here or lose your profit, we need only look to China to discover what they'd do.

As the Wall Street Journal recently reported, Americans continue to leave religion behind in large numbers, even during the pandemic. According to Pew Research, the percentage of American Christians has fallen about 12% over the last ten years, from 75% in 2011 to around 63% today. The number who pray every day is even lower, at 45%. The demographic rising in its place are the so-called "nones," those who identify religiously as "nothing in particular." This group grew to about 20% of the US population in 2021, up from 16% in 2017.

The surprising thing here isn't that Americans are leaving organized religion behind. That's been happening at about the same rate for a while now. However, it is newsworthy that this trend continued unabated in the face of a global pandemic. Historically, catastrophic events that bring uncertainty, stress, or political chaos tend to draw people to reconsider faith.

In this sense, ours is in sharp contrast with other historic moments, such as World War II, the assassination of JFKL, and the Gulf War. More recently, 9/11 brought a flood of Americans back to church and, although the trend wasn't permanent, those who lived through it remember a renewed sense of unity and commitment to spiritual activities such as prayer.

Of course, other moments were deeply divided along religious lines. America's war in Vietnam is a good example. While overall church attendance remained steady, Vietnam represented what some have called "a ripping of the nation's religious fabric." Mainline churches, in particular, posted significant losses about this time. As the Washington Post reported in 1982, the United Presbyterian, Episcopal, and United Church of Christ lost 21%, 15%, and 11% of their membership respectively in the previous decade.

The fact that certain crises inspire unity, and others division, likely says more about the state of the culture affected than the crisis affecting it. The Covid pandemic has only further ignited the rift created by America's massive political and ideological differences, and further shaken religious loyalties. In the 1970s, people reacted to the cultural upheaval by changing religious affiliations. Today, people are dropping their religious identities altogether.

Of course, one reason that Americans didn't flock to churches was many were closed. Still, even after Churches adapted, attendance took a hit. In June 2020, even though 96% of pastors said they offered live streaming services, Barna reported that just 48% of otherwise regular attendees were tuning in. Today, even with Sunday morning services available nearly everywhere, in-person attendance is still between 30-50% lower than before the pandemic.

In contrast, Netflix added an incredible 10 million subscribers to its ranks in just three months in 2020. While an encouraging number of Americans reported that the pandemic strengthened their faith, they were the minority. When given the choice of where to find meaning, Americans chose streaming platforms over church pulpits.

On a purely pragmatic level, this is bad news. Recently Tyler Vanderweele and Brendan Case argued over at Christianity Today that "Empty Pews Are an American Public Health Crisis." They have a point. Study after study suggests that church attendance corresponds with lower rates of substance abuse, divorce, incarceration, and depression…. not to mention higher levels of meaning and satisfaction, volunteering, longevity, and civic engagement.

Given that we are in one of the loneliest eras in recent memory, why aren't Americans back in church? Perhaps a better first question would be, why aren't American Christians back in church?

They may be catechized too well in an entertainment-driven, performance-oriented kind of service. It may be because of the moralistic and therapeutic ways they were taught to think about faith in our hyper-individualistic age, and they found better fulfillment elsewhere. We may be more steeply formed by the liturgies of our age rather than the liturgies of Christian worship.

For Christians, church attendance simply is not optional. Scripture commands it and, for all its imperfections, the Church is the body and bride of Christ. It's how Christians are equipped and sent to proclaim and live the Gospel. It's the means by which Christians grow the kinds of deep roots needed to survive a chaotic and hostile culture. As Scripture says, a cord of three strands is not easily broken, but "pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up."

To be clear, the Church will go on. In particular, outside of the western world, the Church is growing at incredible rates. It will survive COVID, militant secularism, and rampant individualism. In other words, the Church can take up the strands of life together again.

The question is whether we will put down our idols.

Last year, the FDA lifted an important restriction on the "abortion pill," a drug that induces abortion in early pregnancy by starving the preborn child. Prior to the pandemic, doctors were required to meet face-to-face with patients before prescribing the drug, but that requirement was lifted during the pandemic. Last week, the FDA made the policy change permanent.

This comes just as our culture, from psychological literature to the arts, has begun to understand miscarriage as real trauma, even if it is a loss not readily seen.

Part of the trauma is how hidden a miscarriage can feel. The abortion pill causes this trauma on purpose. Not only do many women report physical trauma after so-called "medical" abortion, but without a face-to-face visit, the mother is isolated from one less source of support and accountability.

This is not healthcare.

This is, however, the reality of what it will mean to advocate for the preborn in the days ahead. Hidden evil is allowed to flourish, we must work to change hearts and minds, no matter what the Supreme Court decides.

More than a few folks, from theologian John Calvin to philosopher William James to French theologian and historian Louis Auguste Sabatier, have noted that humans are "incurably religious" creatures. In other words, religion is native to the human heart.

In the history of the world, the wholesale rejections of the supernatural is a quirk of Western secularism. At the same time, it will not ultimately survive the human longing for transcendence and communion with the supernatural, no matter how far technology advances.

Evidence for this analysis is currently on display in Dortmund, Germany. An art exhibition, entitled "Technoshamanism," was recently highlighted in the New York Times article "Space Pagans and Smart Phone Witches: Where Tech Meets Mysticism."

Josie Thaddeus-Jones describes the exhibition, which features the work of twelve artists and collectives, as an exploration of the "connections between technology and esoteric, ancestral belief systems." Visitors are welcomed by quotations from French artist Lucile Olympe Haut's "Cyberwitches Manifesto," which urges readers to, among other things, "use smartphones and tarot cards to connect to spirits" and "manufacture D.I.Y. devices to listen to invisible worlds."

According to the Times, the exhibition is an example of the rising interest in pagan and occult practices among "spiritual but not religious" Westerners. The new development, reports Thaddeus-Jones, is how frequently these practices are being combined with technology: "Spirituality is all over our feeds: The self-help guru Deepak Chopra has co-founded his own [Non-Fungible Token] platform, witches are reading tarot on TikTok, and the A.I.-driven astrology app Co-Star has been downloaded more than 20 million times."

One Brazilian artist at the Technoshamanism exhibition organizes festivals where participants use robots to "connect with ancestral belief systems and the natural world." Other artists imagine a pagan future for humanity in space, where "rituals and visions play as much of a role as solar power and artificial intelligence." For others, animistic customs and psychedelic drugs meet virtual reality and black lights for an experience that looks part séance and part science fiction.

So, why are digital technologies and social media bringing about a resurgence of pagan spirituality? The Times cites an assistant professor at Pennsylvania State University, who says that because of the Internet, "people have access to belief traditions that were not easily accessible to them before." This allows them to "discover, select and combine the spiritual traditions that most [appeal] to them."

Still, availability is only part of the story. Materialists of all stripes have long predicted that the human thirst for superstition would soon vanish with the rise of science and more enlightened societies. Karl Marx famously prophesied that communism would bring the end of religion.

Yet, this renaissance of paganism continues to happen precisely in countries where science and technology have most influenced life. If the Times is right, smart devices and the Internet have only fueled the spread of pagan spirituality.

What this reveals is not only that the draw of the numinous is more enduring than 19th-century atheists ever imagined, but also that secularism isn't satisfying as a worldview. As it turns out, it's not so easy to disenchant the world or the human heart. We are incurably religious creatures.

At the same time, celebrations of "technoshamanism" should remind us that pagan mysticism also fails to fill the "God-shaped vacuum" in every human heart. With VR headsets and tarot apps, would-be witches may try to reimagine what pre-Christian beliefs were like, but real paganism died out in Europe over a thousand years ago. The reason was the advance of Christianity, something historian Rodney Stark has called "The Victory of Reason." Christianity's triumph led to expanded human rights and freedom, capitalism, and the science that made the "tech" in technoshamanism possible in the first place.

Fundamentally, Christ supplanted paganism because His gospel was better news, and the worldview centered on His rule and reign brings rest to the restless human heart. The more secular forces and ideologies in the modern West attempt to replace Christ with belief in nothing, the more paganism rushes back to fill the vacuum. But it has already been tried and found wanting before, and it will fail again. True hope, joy, and dignity come only from Christ, no matter how tech-savvy the world becomes.

Historian and long-time friend of the Colson Center, Dr. Glenn Sunshine joined Shane Morris to discuss if Christmas is a pagan holiday. During his conversation with Shane, Dr. Sunshine answered some of the core questions about Christmas.

For instance, Sunshine argued that December 25th was not chosen as the date for Christmas in order to co-opt a pagan solstice festival. More likely, it was based on an ancient Jewish belief that people are conceived on the date of their deaths. Since Christ died on or around March 25th, some Church Fathers believed that Christ must have been conceived on that day and born nine months later… December 25th.

For more on this topic, visit www.whatwouldyousay.org to find a special video to help guide conversation with your family.