Has the postal grinch stolen Christmas?

It's easy to get sentimental around this time of year because Christmas is the season of love and joy.

I move away from warm and fuzzy feelings when I read about or see attacks on Christmas. Over the years – because the holiday is a religious one – it's been practically removed from schools and beat down at every chance. Schools have become the real battle line in the attack on Christmas from a host of groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union. Lawsuits are threatened or filed, and school districts and public officials fold like they are holding a bad poker hand.

In most schools, gone are the days of Christmas pageants, Christmas trees and Christmas parties in classrooms. They may still have parties and pageants but under another name.

Creches and even Christmas trees and Santa Claus have been banned from many public places. To show how extreme political correctness can go, Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee renamed his state’s Christmas tree a holiday tree.

In the commercial realm, “winter” and “holiday” have sometimes replaced the word Christmas in advertising.

Could it be the United States Postal Service has joined in on the attack? If so, it comes from an unexpected source that depends on the holiday as it's most profitable time of the year.

Go to usps.com/holiday/ and scroll down and look at the December calendar. It's odd to notice that the date Dec. 25 has no mention of Christmas. What makes it strange is that Dec. 8 is noted as the start of Hanukkah and Dec. 26 is the first day of Kwanzaa.

The plot thickens. The calendar is filled with reminders for postal customers with deadlines to get their packages and letters in the mail in time for Christmas delivery. Christmas is mentioned nine times, but not on the actual holiday.

The lack of mention is surprising to me because the U.S. Postal Service does a lot of good to assist communities across the nation. Employees have been heralded for food drives and a great letters-to-Santa program.

I've contacted the U.S. Postal Service media department to help solve the mystery of the missing Christmas, but I'm not holding my breath for a return phone call. Even so, Cindy Lou Who wants an answer.