Got a question? Fill out this form to submit your anonymous question to be answered in a future column.
Dear Miriam,
It’s that time of year… How do I respond to my doctor when they wish me “Merry Christmas?”
Signed,
Healthy Hanukkah
Dear Healthy,
I tend to land way on the side of not correcting people who wish me a merry Christmas. For me, this comes from two places: one, spending my childhood in a place where there were very few Jews, and two, spending my adulthood working in the Jewish community. Because of how I grew up, I don’t expect anyone who celebrates Christmas to anticipate that someone else might not, and because of how my life is now, I am incredibly secure in my Jewish identity and don’t need it confirmed by relative strangers. So when someone wishes me a merry Christmas, like a waiter or cashier or security guard or receptionist, I’m going to say, “Thank you, you too!”
Devoted readers may remember a column around the High Holidays where I advised a reader to gently share with a barista that the coffee shop got their holiday symbols mixed up. My reasoning there is that the coffee shop was going out of their way to be inclusive, so they were likely to be open to the feedback about how to do it better. So, the comparable example here might be that if someone, in December, wishes you a happy Passover, feel free to tell them that the Jewish holiday taking place this month is actually Hanukkah. But, in most cases, a simple polite thank you is all you need to get past an inaccurate greeting.
But, like anything, there are exceptions, and I think your doctor is one of them. In an ideal scenario, a doctor would know who they’re treating, not just the test results or diagnosis, but the whole person. And even if the doctor you’re seeing isn’t naturally going to put in that effort, you deserve to represent your full self in what can otherwise sometimes be a dehumanizing situation. So feel free to say, “Actually I don’t celebrate Christmas,” or “Thank you but that’s not my holiday.” You can adjust the emphaticness of your response according to whether this is a doctor you’ve seen before and are likely to see again, as opposed to a one-time visit, but I’ll leave that determination to you.
Though this may be counterintuitive, I would encourage you not to say, “Actually I celebrate Hanukkah.” That response sets up a binary between Christmas and Hanukkah that doesn’t actually exist and also draws false parallels between two holidays that are essentially connected only because of the time of year in which they occur. So if the doctor counters with, “Oh, excuse me, I meant happy Chanukah,” go ahead and say thank you, but don’t perpetuate the connection between the two if you can help it.
There’s another important exception that I’ll take this opportunity to mention: If anyone says “Merry Christmas” to your children, or any children in your care, and those children want to speak up (or want you to speak up!) to say, “we don’t celebrate Christmas,” do it. Even just the conversation between you of, “Do we want to correct this person?” can be a valuable way to establish Jewish confidence and identity. A related exception is your children’s teachers. Whether your children want to speak up in this case or not, I think it’s important for adults to communicate to their children’s teachers so that they know that not all of their students celebrate Christmas.
As for everyone else you encounter during this season, be polite, kind, and generous, and give them all the benefit of the doubt.
Be well,
Miriam
I appreciate your point to this rich and complex topic!
What would be inaccurate about responding “Happy Holidays!”