Religious leaders demand "immediate cancellation" of "Merry Gothmas" festival
A spooky, family-friendly holiday market in Ventura, CA is under fire from clergy who insist a pun on Christmas is a “grave threat" to their "spiritual health.”
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A handful of religious leaders are demanding the “immediate cancellation” of Merry Gothmas, a family-friendly two-day festival in Ventura, California that blends together Halloween and Christmas.
A glance at the group’s website shows that the event, held at the Ventura County Fairgrounds, is just intended to be a fun unique time for anyone who wants to come. Think The Nightmare Before Christmas but in real life.
Merry Gothmas is a family-friendly celebration of the dark and delightful, featuring eerie artists, wickedly wonderful creators, and haunted holiday treasures to shop during the Unhappy Holidays.
This year’s 2-day event will showcase over 100+ vendors offering creepy Christmas décor, sinister stocking stuffers, taxidermy, oddities, antiques, and spine-chillingly unique gifts.
It’s also very inclusive:
At Merry Gothmas, all are embraced: straight, LGBTQ+, BIPOC, body-positive, sex-positive, neurodivergent, and unapologetically unique. Whoever you are, whatever you are—you belong here.
Based on this highlight reel from last year’s inaugural event, how could you not want to go?
This year’s event will likely be even bigger than last year’s, but that also means it’s drawing more scrutiny, and late last week, a coalition of religious leaders sent a letter to the head of the Ventura County Fairgrounds demanding the event be shut down due to its “serious and deliberate offense” against Christians.
The letter made it sound like this entire event was hate-speech against Christianity when religion has nothing at all to do with it:
Dear Ms. Ortiz,
We the undersigned demand the immediate cancellation of the above event, on the grounds that it is a serious and deliberate offense to the interests of the Christian community and sympathetic other sisters and brothers of faith of Ventura County.
This event is being marketed as an attempt to “summon” spirits, with the assistance of “dark vendors” offering, among other things, “witchy wares,” all with the goal of “embracing the darker side of the season.” These references to spirits, witchcraft, and darkness are all not-very-subtle references to the occult. Practices of this type are offensive to Christians and inimical to Christian belief.
The titling of this event as “Gothmas” is not a mere harmless pun. It is an attempt to distort the name of Christmas, a solemn and religiously significant holiday for Christian believers. This distorted name is being used to promote practices that are directly hostile to Christianity. This type of mockery is completely inappropriate.
Consider, for example, whether the Ventura County Fairgrounds would host an event featuring, perhaps, a pork barbecue, and bearing the name that was a distortion of a Jewish or Islamic holy day. This obviously would not be allowed. This event raises exactly the same issue. The name “Gothmas” clearly is a distortion of the name “Christmas,” which literally means “Christ’s Mass,” a reference to the Catholic Mass as well as worship services of other Christian communities that long has been celebrated on this holiday (i.e., “holy day”). By suggesting that this is a “goth mass” the event organizers clearly are suggesting a connection with a satanic event called a “black mass,” which Is a direct attack on and a mockery of the Catholic Mass and worship among the broader Christian community.
An event of this type poses a grave threat to the spiritual health of the people of Ventura County. Permitting such an event to proceed under a name that also mocks Christianity is grievously inappropriate. Any such names intended to mock religious beliefs, and to promote events offensive to those religions, have no place in a public space such as the Ventura County Fairgrounds.
We therefore request an immediate meeting with those in decision-making authority who are involved in the approval of this event. We will continue to protest and speak out against this abuse of public property for the purpose of mocking and attacking religious faith.
Very truly yours,
Rev. Thomas J. Elewaut Mission Basilica San Buenaventura
Rabbi Lisa Hockberg Miller Temple Beth Torah, Ventura
Deacon Don Huntley Our Lady of Assumption, Ventura
Rev. Skip Thompson, MSA Santa Clara Parish, Oxnard
Very Rev. John W. Love, VF Santa Clara Parish, Oxnard
Rev. Thomas Dome, CRIC Our Lady of Gudalupe, SP
Rev. Chris Reevew, CRIC Our Lady of Gudalupe, SP
Rev. Alejandro Reynada St. Anthony Parish, Oxnard
Rev. Devassy Paldadoth, RCJ St. Francis of Assisi Parish, Fillmore
Rev. Uriel Useda, RCJ St. Francis of Assisi, Fillmore
Rev. Msgr. Emigdio Herrera Santa Clara Chapel, Oxnard
Rev. Daniel Vega Our Lady of Assumption, Ventura
Rev. Vibin Antony, RCJ St. Francis of Assisi, Fillmore
CC: Members of the Board of Directors: Dan Long, Guillermo Rodriguez Ceja Jr., Betsy Chess, Leslie Comejo, Leah Lacayo, Miriam Mack, Gloria Martinez, Dr. Shante Morgan-Carter
Fr. Tom Elewaut, Pastor
That letter basically argues that Pagans, Wiccans, and any other explicitly non-Christian group are inherently anti-Christian and should therefore be banished from public spaces when they’re holding events that riff on a well-known cultural celebration. Religious freedom only applies to those who celebrate Christmas for religious reasons, it seems.
To argue that playing on the word “Christmas” is proof of anti-religious bias is ridiculous. There’s a lottery game called “Oh Ca$hmas Tree.” There’s no shortage of companies that use Christmas symbols to promote their products. Are these leaders protesting those, too? After all, Santa Claus isn’t in the Bible, and a lot of people with no religious allegiance still enjoy the spirit of the holiday season. That’s a far cry from directly mocking a “Jewish or Islamic holy day” that leaves no broader cultural footprint.
These pastors act like someone’s setting a cross on fire during Merry Gothmas.
Christmas is a Pagan holiday anyway. The protesters should be coming to the event to pay their damn respects.
If this event is a "grave threat” to your “spiritual health,” then your faith is weak. It’s that simple. It’s telling that the people signing this letter are are conservative Catholics… with the bizarre exception of one local Jewish leader who leads a pro-LGBTQ synagogue.
On Monday, the group running the Gothmas event posted a statement on Instagram saying that there is “nothing harmful, hateful, or inappropriate” about their celebration. They added that they will “support freedom of expression—theirs and ours” and asked for respect to be shown to them as well.
Christina Diaz, whose “Seaside Oddities Expo” group founded Merry Gothmas and who’s curating the event, told me that they’re not backing down because their intentions were never to alienate anyone. While lawyers can hash this out if needed, if the (government operated) Ventura County Fairgrounds has to cancel this event, it means no religious group could ever use that space either because everyone’s religion is offensive to someone else. Plus—and this is key—there’s nothing anti-Christian about this event.
She told me via email:
Merry Gothmas is a family-friendly holiday art market that celebrates creativity, small businesses, and the local community. Our events have always been inclusive spaces that welcome people of all backgrounds, beliefs, and traditions.
This year, some local churches have voiced concerns and may choose to protest. While we respect their right to peaceful expression, these claims misrepresent what our event is. Merry Gothmas is not a religious gathering, nor does it promote any belief system - it’s simply a spooky-themed holiday market featuring artists, makers, and performers who love alternative aesthetics.
Our focus remains on supporting small businesses, providing a safe and welcoming space for attendees, and offering a fun, festive experience for families across Ventura County. We’re grateful for the overwhelming support from the community and look forward to another successful event.
For now, all this incident really reveals is the fragility of the protestors’ arguments. They’re not defending Christianity; they’re defending a faith that’s so brittle that the mere existence of an alternative festival feels like a personal attack. There’s no “spiritual” danger here because these people are confusing being the subject of criticism or mockery with simply not being the center of attention. Merry Gothmas doesn’t diminish Christianity. It doesn’t insult Christian worship. It just exists alongside it. But Christians don’t own the cultural version of Christmas any more than they own December itself.
This festival will go on as scheduled because there’s a demand for it. Diaz’s response—full of clarity, inclusion, and calm—stands in stark contrast to the fear-mongering tone of the protest letter. Hopefully no one in the area will fall for the fake panic. (What’s next? Historians going after Renaissance Faire?)
If you’re offended by a mild pun, you have no business leading a church, much less demanding that the local government shut down an event. Because this controversy isn’t really about Christmas at all. It’s about whether public spaces are open to the public… or just the fraction of the public that believes in the Christian worldview.
The louder those religious leaders whine, the clearer it becomes to everyone why they shouldn’t be taken seriously.
To snowflake xtians:
Aside from the fact that you purloined xmas from pagans, you do NOT own the holidays. Grow the fuck up.
I have to admit this article was very difficult to read, over the sounds of me furiously Googling how to get to Ventura, California.