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Rather ironic that CBS would air a holiday bumper featuring a Christmas carol with a religious message. Just a year before that bumper began running, network executives pitched a fit when Charles Schulz and Bill Melendez screened a “Charlie Brown Christmas” for them. They didn’t like the concept of using child actors to voice the Peanuts characters, they didn’t like Vince Guraldi’s jazz score, and most of all they hated Linus’s recitation from second chapter of Luke’s gospel.

Unfortunately for CBS, Schulz had creative control over the project and refused to make any changes. Additionally, it had been something of a rush to get the special on the air and by the time the executives saw it, there was no time to find a replacement special. And the sponsor (Coca-Cola) had no problems with the program, so CBS reluctantly aired a Charlie Brown Christmas.

You know the rest: huge ratings, a Peabody Award and program that became a Christmas classic. If the suits at CBS had their way, the program would have never aired.

Secularism at CBS (and the other networks) has been in vogue for much longer than most people realize.

Secularism at CBS (and the other networks) has been in vogue for much longer than most people realize.

I know. However, it was not as much "in your face" like now and despite their misgivings, Charles Schultz did get his way. Back then up to the mid 1980's, we did have more freedom then, be it Charles Schultz's religious message or Norman Lear's liberalism on "All in the Family." Even though the latter mocked conservatives many times, I still cannot see "All in the Family" on TV today with the PC speech codes we have today. Still, it was a different time and although the rot was starting then, we still have most of our sanity. When Peanut's Christmas aired, I was just a twinkle in Mom's eye, it is a special episode to me. The way Linus explained Christmas sends a chill down my spine and a tear to my eye.

Mom passed away last year, a week before Thanksgiving, so the holiday period is hard on me, I miss her very much. We were like Batman and Robin so to speak and now I feel like Robin without Batman. B-(

Do they even still show "Charlie Brown Christmas" on TV anymore? It's been years since I saw "network" TV so I'm not sure if they do or not.

Growing up in the 1970s, that was an annual staple along with other animated classics like "Frosty the Snowman", "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" and "The Grinch that Stole Christmas." I'm sure there were others.

I really need to get to YouTube to see them again. The other night, my wife and I watched the Albert Finney version of "Christmas Carol" ("Scrooge") from 1970.

That film brought back good memories for me as I was taken to see that movie on a classroom field trip when I was in the second grade. That was literally the last time I saw that movie and I had vivid memories of seeing it that first time. I remember having nightmares about the ghost of Christmas Past and it was the first time I ever thought about the fact that all of us are fated to die someday.

It was great to watch that film after some 42 years and realize that last time I saw it, I was only 8 years old.

During the 1970s, the liberals were beginning to take over the school system but I was fortunate enough to remember a time when Christmas was actually allowed in the schools and we could call it such. We had a significant Jewish population in our schools but we never had any issues about that. The Jewish kids seemed to get into the Christmas spirit just fine and consequently, we had no issue whatsoever with observing Hannukah and learning about Menorahs and Dreidels.

It was a time when we were actually tolerant of each other's religious beliefs and school kids were not taught to hate Christmas and all things Christian.

Like another earlier reply said, it was a different country and a different time. I'm glad to have experienced it - my children and theirs never will.