With the holiday season upon us, the hustle and bustle of buying gifts, decorations and writing Christmas cards can make us forget the true meaning of the holidays. Our society lets the media define many aspects of our lives, emphasize a party atmosphere, and tend to promote change in everything from clothes and food to technology.

This is not the best combination when dealing with traditional holy days. A simple Web search for Christmas turns up 20 pages of Christmas cookies, decorations, candies and Santa. Typical representations of Christmas are sleighs, reindeer, snowmen and stars, but these symbols mask the true spirit of the holiday.

Mount Desert Island High School conducted a survey to learn what different holidays mean to different people. Students and teachers were asked what thought first popped into their heads when several holidays were mentioned. The top three responses for Christmas were: presents, trees and Santa, along with nine alternative answers.

Christmas is by far the most commercialized holiday in America. People who honor religious holidays such as Hanukkah, Tet and Ramadan, or who have no religious affiliation, are all bombarded with our society’s excitement about Christmas. Television and radio advertisements put out before Thanksgiving push people to shop, shop, shop and spend, spend, spend, so that Christmas seems to be just a chunk of time in which stores and businesses can thrive.

Shop windows display Christmas decorations and scenarios in such a way as to say that the essence of Christmas can be bought there. With deals such as “free gift wrapping with every purchase!,” they reel consumers in like trout. Modern gift giving has become a multimillion-dollar industry. At an online consumer site called Mvyesta, a news release stated that each person spent an average of $722 while Christmas shopping in the 2002 holiday season. News-Press.com featured a survey of the top five items that will be purchased this year. In order, they are clothing, entertainment products, gift certificates, books, and food or liquor.

Originally, Christmas was revered as a religious celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ. Perhaps a more secular celebration is appropriate for our society, but even the historical and cultural aspects of the winter holidays get lost in the shopping frenzy.

Many of the popular symbols we use today have historical significance. Gift giving started long ago at Roman festivals with presents such as twigs from sacred groves. The Christmas trees in our living rooms that bring us holiday cheer were hung upside down from ceilings during the 12th century as symbols of the Holy Trinity. Our beloved Santa Claus evolved from ancient mythological rulers of the sky. A 17th century Dutchman, Sinter Klaas, helped shape and name the character “St. Nicholas” by giving gold and helping people who needed it without asking for anything.

Today, Santa Claus is the center of Christmas. The jolly old man with sparkling eyes and a tummy like jelly is said to visit each home in the world to fill stockings with toys for all the nice girls and boys, or coal for those who have been naughty. His mode of transportation is a sleigh drawn by eight tiny reindeer that flies through the night sky to fulfill his holiday duty.

Each of us needs to look inside ourselves and at the long and rich historical traditions that surround the winter celebrations, to decide what our holiday duty should be. Whether our expression is spiritual, serious or silly, it doesn’t have to be expensive to be good.

Schools participating in Student Union include Hampden Academy, Brewer High School, John Bapst Memorial High School, Old Town High School, Mount Desert Island Regional High School, Stearns High School in Millinocket, Nokomis Regional High School, Hermon High School, and Schenck High School in East Millinocket.