The attempts around the country to eliminate the term "Christmas" are being perpetrated largely in the name of "political correctness"--to avoid offending anyone, particularly Muslims, whose beliefs would exclude them from any Christmas celebrations.

These efforts represent, not secularism, but the standard liberal, subjectivist philosophy of multiculturalism, which seeks to prohibit any "offensive" actions and words--and it is a philosophy that should be denounced.

Christmas can be celebrated as an entirely secular holiday, and public schools should therefore be permitted to do so. The prohibition against the endorsement of religion by governmental entities, however, is an entirely different matter: it is a Constitutional issue of separation of church and state. While public schools may celebrate Christmas, they have no right to make it into a religious observance, by featuring explicitly religious themes like the Nativity.