Christianity was much maligned during the early AD, this lead Christians to adopt a symbol called an Ichthus to communicate with fellow believers. Christians in the 21st century aren’t maligned as much as they are marginalized, nonetheless we too use a method to quietly probe what might be a shared faith between intersecting strangers. This subtle method I speak of can only be observed during the month of light bulbs and wrapping paper, also known as December and occurred to me while a vendor and I were chatting about next years upcoming products. At some point during our conversation I received an urgent call to clean up a spill so my vendor started the necessary verbage to end the conversation. I found myself listening for the code phrase, quite subconsciously mind you, that would tell me he was what I thought he was. The last thing he said to me was “Merry Christmas” and not “Happy Holidays” like some Santa yuppie. Of course I know many unbelievers say Merry Christmas too but this story is about my vendor who I did have previous inklings about something religiously familiar to me. When my vendor said “Merry Christmas” all was well in my world because I knew then he was what I thought he was, that and he pretty much told me…
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