A pastor and a Christian activist group, leading a publicity campaign to patronize retailers who keep the name of Jesus Christ in holiday “Christmas” promotions, say their efforts are meant to protect free speech.

Pastor Patrick L. Wooden, who leads Raleigh’s Upper Room Church of God in Christ, and Called 2 Action, which promotes conservative social values such as same-sex marriage bans and the right to life for the unborn, sponsored a full-page advertisement (PDF format) in The News & Observer of Raleigh on Nov. 22 to urge readers to shop at stores that unashamedly promote “Christmas” rather than the generic “holiday” season.

“Many of you celebrate Christmas [emphasis in the ad] by purchasing gifts to give to others,” the advertisement said. “Please patronize businesses that include the greeting ‘Merry Christmas.'”

The ad ran two days before the busiest shopping day of the year, known as “Black Friday.” In a press release, Steve Noble, chairman of Called 2 Action, warned that recent years’ trends among retailers to remove Christian language from holiday season’s greetings represented a first step toward speech constraints.

“We must all wake up to the fact that there are Americans today who, like King Herod, are troubled at even the mention of Jesus’ name, and they are doing everything in their power to publicly eradicate His memory,” Noble said. “If they can get that done, they might then focus their attacks on the very Gospel itself — and try to have it condemned as so-called ‘hate speech.'”

In recent years Christians have grown increasingly vocal about retailers who failed to acknowledge their holiday’s foundation, grounded in the birth of Jesus Christ. Popular Fox News Channel host Bill O’Reilly waged a high-profile campaign last year on “The O’Reilly Factor” in opposition to the de-Christianization of Christmas. Another Fox host, John Gibson, wrote a book on the controversy that was published last October: The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought.

“I think a lot of retailers have been operating out of fear,” Noble said in a telephone interview. “They were responding to this political correctness run amok.”

This year some merchants got the message. Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, said Nov. 9 that it had repented of previous seasons’ diminishment of the word “Christmas” from its decorations and promotions. In a press release the company proclaimed, “Wal-Mart is in the spirit and spreading Christmas cheer this holiday season!”

The company changed the name of its seasonal decorations areas in stores from “The Holiday Shop” to “The Christmas Shop,” and also says it increased the amount of merchandise renamed from “Holiday” to “Christmas” by about 60 percent.

“This year, more than ever, our shoppers will see and hear more about Christmas and the incredible values Wal-Mart is providing for their holiday shopping needs,” said John Fleming, executive vice president of marketing. Wal-Mart also is promoting initiatives such as The Salvation Army’s Red Kettle campaign and “Operation Christmas,” which supports families of military personnel deployed overseas.

Meanwhile Target, Wal-Mart’s chief competitor, will prohibit bell-ringers from The Salvation Army from the fronts of its stores. Instead the company announced it would donate $1 million to the charity’s online Angel Tree giving program. Noble called the move an improvement over Target’s previous policy.

According to Called 2 Action’s Web site, the organization will keep a list of stores that promote Christmas, and also a list of those that don’t. Noble said he was just beginning to compile the list.

Paul Chesser ([email protected]) is associate editor of Carolina Journal.