(LIGHT JINGLING)
Garrison Keillor: Where did it all come from, this incessant jingling and the ho-ho-hoing, the frenzy of shopping and giving and returning and exchanging and then putting gifts into storage for twenty years and throwing them away? You walk through the airport in Sarasota, Florida, and (PIANO) a player piano is banging out "Frosty the Snowman" and there is frost sprayed on a big spruce tree and where did this come from? It goes back to the days when the year had three digits, not four, back in Rome --when a woman name Tiffanius approached the Church Fathers.
Sue Scott (SIMPLY): Most exalted and reverential Church Fathers, I, a mere woman, hence a serf, a vassal, do with utmost trembling approach thy holy presence and beg for your ear.
Tim Russell: Speak, Tiffanius.
SS: Okay. Listen-- we've got a problem. Saturnalia. The big pagan festival of feasting and belching and drinking and vomiting. A lot of our people are going over there with the pagans and tying one on and getting hammered and then coming back on Sunday as if nothing happened.
TR: Horrors! Have those people expelled from the church immediately and hurled into outer darkness to await the judgment!!!
SS: Okay, but there are a lot of them.
TR: Oh. (PAUSE FOUR BEATS) How many? Several?
SS: Thousands.
TR: Oh. Dear.
SS: And they're major donors.
TR: Oh. -- Darn. -- What should we do then?
SS: Most exalted and reverential Father, if I, a mere woman, a preparer of meals and cleaner of toilets, may presume to offer advice to you, O wise and righteous --
TR: Go ahead. What should we do?
SS: We'll start our own feast and we'll do everything the pagans do except we'll make it Christian.
TR: We'll do everything the pagans do??
SS: We'll just take their tree and put an angel on it.
TR: You know, Tiffanius-- I think you've got something. (BRIDGE)
GK: And so the Christian faithful were encouraged to feast and belch and drink and vomit just like the pagans and pretty soon there were very few pagans left, everybody had gone over to the other side except a few really devout pagans.
Fred Newman (REVERB): The temple is deserted, my son. Only you and I remain to do honor to the gods.
TR (TEEN, REVERB): They've all gone over to the Christians, father.
FN (REVERB): It's the old story. We did it to the Greeks -- stole their gods -- now the Christians steal our feasts.
TR (REVERB): What can we do, father?
FN (REVERB): O Zeus-- we do beseech thee to punish these Christians by creating great anxiety among them, and envy, and gluttony, and enormous Christmas traffic jams so that they will become consumed with anger and curse each other and think violent thoughts --! (STING, BRIDGE)
GK: And so the ancient gods punished the Christians, and they continue to punish us today. (SS ANGUISHED: Why can't I do a simple thing like decorate a Christmas tree? Look at it. It's all lopsided. The oyster stew tastes like macaroni and cheese. I didn't finish my shopping. I can't wrap presents like my mother did. I just can't do it. And look at that tree. It's a mess) Meanwhile, there are traffic jams (A VARIETY OF HORNS, ANGRY SHOUTS), but out on Long Island, in the town of Bethlehem, people enjoy Christmas just as they did on that first Christmas years ago when the schleppers were watching Fox and they saw a star in the sky.
TR: Hey-- lookit that.
FN: Cool.
TR: What is that?
FN: Let's go see.
TR: But we were supposed to shlep this stuff over to Judy's.
FN: We can shlep it later. Let's go.
GK: Nobody expected the Messiah would come from Long Island. People from Manhattan had looked down on Long Island for years.
SS: From where? Long Island? You gotta be kidding.
GK: But there he was. And there were the three Wise Guys.
TR (NYER): We got the gold, we got the myrrh, we got the frankfurters.
FN: What's myrrh?
TR (NYER): I don't know. Murray brought it. Hey Murray?
FN (DEEP): Yeah.
TR (NYER): What's the myrrh for?
FN (DEEP): Ya put it on the frankfurters. It's like mustard.
GK: And there were choirs of heavenly angels singing--
ALL: Fantastic. Fabulous. Awesome.
(THEME)