Christmas Online Forums Around the World
by Dorothy Porawski | 24 December 2024 |
After over a decade of discussions and arguments on this topic, I’ve stopped participating in online forum discussions about Christmas. I am resigned that there is nothing which could be written that would so much as make a dent in the zealous opposition to Christmas by some believers.
The issue isn’t that the counterarguments are weak, but that the people standing behind them are incorrigible. Sometimes their statements are toxic and pathological.
I belong to three private groups/forums on social media. The two groups with the most shock value are “Seventh day adventist around the world” with 967.6K members and “Seventh-day Adventists Worldwide” with 227.1K members. On a typical day there is no lack of AI-generated images of toddlers standing in torrential rain asking for an AMEN, or Taylor Swift holding a whiteboard to promote the prosperity gospel: Money is coming your way in BILLIONS…. CLAIM IT!”
These groups are also heavy in modesty culture messages, marriage permanence messages, young men looking for wives, and lots of content by Randy Skeete, Doug Bachelor, and Ted Wilson. Questions arise such as “What does the “G” in Ellen G. White stand for?” (“Grace,” “Gold,” and “Great” were suggested.) “Is hugging before marriage allowed?” (Answer: According to Ellen White: No.)
With such an arsenal of members, I am frequently concerned about how much of this represents the mentality of beliefs of delegates from these parts of the non-western world, and I feel a general helplessness.
Meanwhile, here in Poland…
This is different from the angry frustration I feel when I read the discussions taking place in the Adventist Forum group with 1.6K members in my country of residence, Poland. Usually it is a place where fundamentalist content, conspiracy theories, and freshly translated sermons of Walter Veith enjoy popularity. However, every year in mid-December it, too, turns into a Christmas topic cesspool where emotions run high and a large number of toxic, pathological behaviours can be observed.
Poland has a complicated backstory. The Christmas chapter from Ellen White’s The Adventist Home was not originally translated and included in the 1965, 1983, 1990, or 2010 versions. It wasn’t until 2020 that the book was completely retranslated and the Christmas chapter included. While today Poles can only theorize as to why this decision was made (and it mostly likely had to do with being separate and distinct from Catholic practices dominating the country, combined with the anti-Catholic Communist regime occupying Poland at that time),1 many Adventist Poles make statements online which show their surprise that Ellen White in any way, shape, or form supported any aspect of the Christmas holidays—above all, the Christmas tree! They also are shocked to the point of denial in some cases to read her other statements regarding Christmas in the Review and Herald in 1879, 1884, and 1885.
This is an example of spiritual abuse on the administrative and institutional level which must not be minimized. Willingly keeping information from members from a source which they consider to be inspired or crucial to their spiritual practices falls into authoritarian dynamics and reduces the individual agency of its members. Is it any wonder that some Polish Adventists lash out from disillusionment when they discover that not only did Ellen White not prohibit a Christmas tree in the church sanctuary, but she didn’t prohibit one at home, either?2
What are we saying?
While I understand the issue in Poland, I am not able to analyze precisely why, in many non-western countries, Christmas is so hotly debated. Has it got to do with religious syncretism? Is it something else? Regardless, the demeaning way in which so-called Seventh-day Adventists engage with one another on this topic is not only unacceptable, in my opinion, but it clinically fits into several toxic categories.
As an exercise, I gathered a number of comments from the three above-mentioned groups which were either similar, repetitive, or simply outstanding. All have been published in the last week. With the help of artificial intelligence, I’ve placed them into the following macro categories, although some fit in more than one.
Spiritual Gaslighting: Undermining others’ beliefs and understanding to force conformity, often by dismissing interpretations, redefining evidence, or invalidating experiences.
- Christmas is for Catholics who pray to Mary, not for us Adventists because we know better.
- The Ellen White quotes you are citing (from the Review and Herald and Adventist Home) do not necessarily mean what you are saying they mean when read in their greater context.
- I don’t believe that these are Ellen White quotes.
- If you celebrate Christmas, God does not know you.
Weaponized Faith: Using divine authority, scripture, or religious tradition to shame, control, or isolate individuals.
- “Our God doesn’t allow us to [celebrate Christmas]….”
- “Jesus hates that you celebrate pagan holidays.”
- “God doesn’t want you to celebrate Christmas!”
- “Your practices are typical of those at the end of time when everything will be corrupted.”
- “Christmas is an abomination to God.”
Cultic Behavior: Enforcing strict boundaries around “acceptable” beliefs, and rejecting alternative views as heretical or apostate, often creating in-group/out-group dynamics.
- “Christmas is a vain pagan custom not to be followed by true followers of Jesus Christ/Adventists.”
- “You are not celebrating Christ’s birth when you celebrate Christmas. You are celebrating the birth of a pagan god!”
- “Real Adventists don’t believe that way!”
- “If it is not written exactly and literally in the Bible, I won’t believe it.”
- “When this person [believes differently than how we think he would], then he is not inspired by God!”
Fear-Based Manipulation: Inducing fear of divine rejection, eternal consequences, or social ostracism to compel compliance.
- “It is the apostasy of Satan which misled the entire world…like celebrating Christmas. Do not be deceived!”
- “If we don’t know when Jesus was born, celebrating it on December 25 is unbiblical and therefore wrong!”
- “Celebrating Christmas means you have conformed to the world, which is bad!”
- “I am ashamed of you for believing the way you do.”
- “If someone really wants to understand…the Holy Spirit will reveal it to them.
While online arguing is generally futile, it isn’t necessarily harmful. The examples I have provided above, however, are toxic and abusive. Administrators and moderators of such groups should do more to make online forums safe places which facilitate healthy dialog. Public figures of church authority should also step in and quell threads which are spiraling out of control in the groups which they belong to, as well as be exemplary in their online presence.
Ultimately, for the participants who feel bad, attacked, or upset by these topics, it comes down to boundaries and self-respect. There will always be those who don’t want to change even when shown that their behaviour is pathological. Keep scrolling, snooze for a while, or just unfollow altogether.
1Siciński, Andrzej, Nowa “Chrześcijańska Rodzina,” Znak Czasu, March/April 2020 issue, pp 27, 28
2“Let the Christmas tree in your home or church be a symbol of your offering to God, indicating that you remember the needy.” (Review and Herald, December 9, 1884)
Dorothy Porawski is an American expat who has lived half of her life teaching English as a foreign language in Poland.
