Not Thinking Outside The Manger

About ten years ago, I worked at the service counter of a local grocery store. One of the cashiers was a young woman who was a senior at a local Catholic high school, so she would have been about seventeen or eighteen. She was an honors student there, so I figured she was kind of smart, too.

One evening, about a week before Christmas, she came stomping up to the service counter.

Cashier: “You’re old. Explain it to me.”

Okay, not the best way to start a conversation. Maybe she’s not as smart as I thought. For the record, I was forty-five at this time.

Me: “Sorry, explain what?”

She waved her hand around.

Cashier: “All this. The shopping, the cooking, and all the decorating. Why are all these people doing all this?”

Me: “Probably for the same reason your family does. Most people just want their families to have a nice Christmas.”

Cashier: “But they can’t all be Catholic.”

Me: “I’m sure they aren’t. What does that have to do with anything?”

Cashier: “Well, Christmas is a Catholic holiday.”

I was surprised to hear this at my advanced age.

Me: “Uh, Christmas is a Christian holiday, not just a Catholic one. Christians of all stripes celebrate it — not always like you or me, but it’s a holiday for all Christians.”

Cashier: “Are you sure? That doesn’t seem right. I’ll have to ask at school tomorrow.”

She walked away, still mumbling about how that didn’t seem right. Considering that she was an honors student at her school and hadn’t realized Christmas is not just a Catholic holiday, I wasn’t convinced about the answer she would get.

But I’m old, so what do I know?