Minutes after the council voted 4-2 Thursday night to change the name, Councilwoman-at-Large Charlene Storey walked out of the meeting. Storey, who was raised Catholic still describes portrays herself as a non-believer, stated the town’s decision to alter the formal occasion’s name from “A Tree Lighting” to “A Christmas Tree Lighting” favors one faith & “cuts non-Christians out of the loop”.
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The second highest-ranking council member and the town’s only woman to serve as an elected official, Storey explained her decision in a statement. Roselle Park mayor Carl A. Hokanson told Eyewitness News that he wanted to bring the word “Christmas” back into the equation.
The Roselle Park councilwoman who resigned Thursday after the council voted to change the name of the borough’s “Tree Lighting” to a “Christmas Tree Lighting” is now rescinding her resignation.
Hokanson said when he was a kid in Roselle Park the event was always called a “Christmas Tree Lighting”.
She said changing the name of the ceremony, “turned it form a non-religious event to a religious one”. Now, from this point forward, it will be called a “Christmas tree” lighting ceremony.
In addition to seeing a more diverse holiday setting in the city, Storey also wants a more diverse council.
“So I find it hard to accept that to them, a “Christmas” tree is a secular tree”, she wrote.
Starbucks came under fire for its new holiday cup, which lacks any holiday-themed artwork. Real trees declined in popularity by 36 percent just 10 years ago, however Kent Hutchinson at Trinity Tree Farms says real trees are beginning to make a come back.
Although the new coffee cup design was meant to keep the holiday season pure and simple, former pastor Joshua Feuerstein took offense to the plain cups and accused Starbucks of removing “Christmas from their cups because they hate Jesus”.
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Storey said she regretted having to resign but called the issue a matter of principle.
