Then there’s this, from the March 2001 Public Square :
They try their best, but Ross G. Douthat, a Harvard junior who started reading First Things when he was twelve years old, writes in the Crimson that even at Harvard they fall somewhat short of a total obliteration of historical and cultural fact. Surrounding the “winter break,” there is no mention of Christmas, of course, but an official Harvard mailing did wish folks a “happy millennial observance.” Douthat thought this displayed “a remarkable lack of respect for those faiths that choose not to follow a dating system based upon an obscure Nazarene carpenter’s historically dubious birth.” But maybe they’re not aware of the origins of the system. “If you believe their academic jargon, after all, we’ve just completed two thousand years of the ‘Common Era’—which apparently took over when the Uncommon Era ran out of gas midway through the reign of Caesar Augustus.” After almost ten years of reading FT, he might want to think about writing for us.
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