“Christmas is an obstacle to modern progress”

By Tom Quiner

The three most quoted men in history are:

1. Jesus

2. William Shakespeare

3. G.K. Chesterton

You are probably most familiar with the first two.

G.K. Chesterton was a proud atheist until the logic and evidence of Christianity beat him down.

His subsequent writings on Christianity were so persuasive, that they helped convert another proud atheist, a gentleman by the name of C.S. Lewis.

These two men were two of the most formidable Christian apologists of the 20th century. They made the case for God and for Christ and for faith with such humor, intelligence, and sheer logic, that they pounded the faith of atheists into dust until nothing was left but a love for Christ.

Both Chesterton and Lewis held onto their faith in the happenstance of life, aka atheism, out of sheer pride and stubbornness until their intellect succumbed to reason; their head to their heart.

Here is Chesterton’s comment on Christmas:

“Christmas is an obstacle to modern progress. Rooted in the past, and even the remote past, it cannot assist a world in which the ignorance of history is the only clear evidence of the knowledge of science. Born among miracles reported from two thousand years ago, it cannot expect to impress that sturdy common sense which can withstand the plainest and most palpable evidence for miracles happening at this moment. . . .Christmas is not modern; Christmas is not Marxian; Christmas is not made on the pattern of that great age of the Machine, which promises to the masses an epoch of even greater happiness and prosperity than that to which it has brought the masses at this moment. Christmas is medieval; having arisen in the earlier days of the Roman Empire. Christmas is a superstition. Christmas is a survival of the past.”

Here is C.S. Lewis on Christmas:

“The Son of God became a man to enable men to become the sons of God.”

Merry Christmas!