By Julian De Ocampo ’13
The ROUNDUP

I was raised in the ways of Christmas specials on TV and “White Christmas” blaring out of every shopping mall and car in the city.

There is a lot to the festive season: decorating the tree, wearing kitschy sweaters, drinking hot chocolate and waiting for Santa.

These all add up to create the season of good will.

In grade school, I fondly remember Christmas decorations adorning the halls and a feeling of upbeat anticipation growing. That’s why I’m glad to see that Brophy is stepping up its Christmas decorations this year.

It seems most often Christmas becomes the break between two semesters, and it sometimes seems that people don’t care about Christmas as much as they used to.

We so often hear that the commercialization of Christmas has mutated it into some sort of retail store nirvana that comes around once a year.

Even so, there’s something universal and non-commercial about the holiday.

Regardless of whether or not you are a Christian, the holiday of Christmas has become bigger than that.

It’s about kindness, joy and charity.

Celebrating Christmas should be seen as a celebration of an extension of friendship.

Perhaps the focus these days has started to shift into a battle of gift-giving. But Christmas has never really been about the presents.

At the risk of sounding like a walking, talking Christmas special cliché, I have to say that Christmas is about being a better person.

It’s about remembering what makes us human and working towards something bigger than us.

So I applaud Brophy and the Student Council for their attempt to decorate the campus more than last year, where there was little Christmas spirit aside from the trees in the chapel and a few Christmas lights.

I know we’re all older, and this isn’t the little Catholic grade school I attended as a kid, but maybe we should all take some time to remember Christmas this year and the joy that it should bring.

Maybe it’s nostalgia talking, but Christmas is something worth talking about.