When the Church Turns Into a Pub

Excepting the sudden new values proclaimed after revolutions – the French revolution with its new calendar and Festival of the Supreme Being, the Russian with its "Octobering" ceremonies replacing Christenings – new ideas and new forms of life invariably continue in old shells. Just as the Pantheon became a Christian church, and Hagia Sophia switches from cathedral to mosque, we continue to use "Christmas" as a catch-all term for a combination of a millennia-old midwinter gathering and a hypercapitalist festival of consumption, which dates from late 19th-century America.

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