#6 Pretending There's a Santa Claus

While it is definitely true that white Christians love sound doctrine, they love to celebrate the Christmas season even more. This is why perfectly rational white Christians are blinded by the tinsel of "the Season", and participate in a full-on buy-in of the pro-Santa agenda.

White Christians force their children to sit on Santa's lap whether they like it or not. White Christian children are instinctively hesitant to embrace such a ludicrous concept- they hate Santa (and who wouldn't?). But with the gradual erosion of their Santa hatred (accelerated by the "belief catalyst" of seemingly unlimited future presents) young children learn to "play nice" with this fat, annual sugar daddy.

White Christians tell their children that Santa has come to give them presents, even though they drove home from the children's Christmas program in a vehicle with a bumper sticker that reads "Jesus is the Reason for the Season."

Some white Christians will warn against the dangers of lying to children about imaginary figures, and that "Santa" is dangerously close to "Satan," but these fringe white Christians are brushed aside as being "Scrooges." Young white Christians inevitably come to the realization that their parents have been lying to them about Santa and may also begin to wonder about a character who supposedly healed the sick and walked on water. While this conversation with their children may be quite awkward, it is easily outweighed by the high the white Christian parents got years ago from taking their child to see Santa.

#5 One-Hour Church Services

White Christians will only attend churches that are structured and orderly. While black Christian church services are known to go on for hours, white Christians fully expect to be out after one hour - no more, no less. If the pastor goes long, he'll be ruining the roast - a part of the Sabbath as important as church itself.

The only acceptable reasons for going over the one hour allotted are communion and multiple baptisms (a single baptism is expected to replace either a praise song or one out of the three points of the sermon), and even then it better not be more than 15 minutes. White Christians will allow the Spirit to move them to clap or sway slightly during praise and worship, but they prefer that the Spirit does not move them to sing any additional, unscheduled songs.

Longer tenured members may pass down tales of services in which baptism, profession of faith, communion, a visit from the church sponsored missionary, and installation of elders combined to form the perfect storm of lengthy church services. All of these events are usually welcome in a white Christian church service, but when combined, white Christians know that the third sacrament of the one-hour church service is in jeopardy.

It's best to avoid informing white Christians that not all churches are so rigid in their worship service schedule. If they can get beyond their shocked disbelief, they will probably mutter something about speaking in tongues and swinging from chandeliers.

#4 Candlelight Ceremonies

Whether for remembrance ceremonies, weddings, prayer vigils, or holiday mood-lighting, nothing tugs at the heart-strings of a white Christian quite like a candlelight ceremony. There's something about the hundreds of flickers of light, the flame symbolism, and that "unity moment" of lighting a neighbor's candle with their candle that drives white Christians crazy.

White Christians always enjoy the opportunity to worship "in creation" (creation being limited only to the outdoors). In fact, every white Christian secretly longs to be outside for every possible worship experience. Since over 65% of all candle-light ceremonies are outdoors, it is only natural that white Christians associate candlelight ceremonies with a positive worship experience. When an outdoor memorial service is combined with uplifting music and brisk but comfortable sweater weather, you have stumbled upon white Christian worship bliss.

You might think to yourself- isn't it dangerous to have hundreds of white Christians in one place with open flames - won't they burn their bulletins (now called "programs" by most white Christians)? And what about all of that wax dripping down? The white Christian enjoys the implicit danger with the open flames and the kindling of bulletins- the danger only adds to the enjoyment. In fact, during candlelight ceremonies, white Christians have even been known to give these flame sticks to children. As for the dripping wax- fear not, the crafty white Christian has thought of a solution- every candle is equipped with a cardboard "wax catching ring" that catches the vast majority of the wax, preventing injury.

Finally, as with most things that white Christians like, Candlelight services provide an evangelism opportunity. Candle light services are largely intended to attract catholics to protestant services. While white Christians like candles, catholics love them.

#3 Contemporary Worship

White Christians have always found things to argue over, from Copernicus' heliocentric cosmology to Martin Luther's 95 theses. However, few things have divided white Christians like contemporary worship. The meaning of contemporary worship is constantly evolving; depending on the white church it could mean using the gray hymnal instead of the blue hymnal, using a projector for song lyrics, or (horror of horrors) a praise band complete with drums and electric guitars.

The white churches that survive this controversy intact always decide to have two separate services: a "traditional" service far too early in the morning where guitars and drums are forbidden and a "contemporary service" so late in the day as to conflict with watching football where choirs, organs, hymns and hearing yourself sing are forbidden.

The "contemporary" service, having been purged of everyone over the age of 65, allows for singing more upbeat praise songs. These songs will often refer to dancing, but never fear, absolutely no dancing ever occurs at white Christian churches. During an especially upbeat song, white Christians may begin to clap to the beat, but usually become confused as to whether to continue clapping through the chorus and give up on the clapping altogether. Expert-level white Christians will continue clapping until the end of the song, but they prefer to lift their hands in the air.