I was going to do this on Day 6, but then it aired last night and I couldn’t help bumping it up the list. My latest Entertainment Magazine had this one in the Bulls-Eye section, with the caption “for 25 minutes all is right with the world”. They're right. This may be the sweetest, most sincere Christmas special ever produced. It also includes the most important message on what Christmas is supposed to be about.

IMO, it’s the best of the Peanuts specials, with the best score ever. (Come on, tell me you don’t start tapping your foot when that jazz version of “O Christmas Tree” begins.)

Poor Charlie Brown is so befuddled over Christmas. He doesn’t get it, wonders why it all seems so commercialized. Just think, the special aired in 1965. How much worse is the commercialism now, with the race to start Black Friday sales now encroaching further into Thanksgiving Thursday? The mad dash of people knocking each other over as they race to save a few bucks on the latest HD TV? 

Then sweet, wise Linus brings it all into perspective, with an unvarnished Bible passage. And Charlie Brown’s little tree just needs a little love.

True story: One year my mom bought a Christmas tree from a kid who was selling them for a school fundraiser. That tree WAS the Charlie Brown tree. It lost EVERY SINGLE NEEDLE. In the end they all ended up on the floor. EVERY SINGLE NEEDLE.

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