Charlie Brown isn't the only one who asks, "What's Christmas all about?" Real people also ask that same question. Several years ago there was an exchange student from Indonesia, spending his first December in America. The crowds of shoppers in the stores, the Santa Clauses, the bright lights, the trees, the manger scenes, the parties, and the growing sense of excitement and revelry - it was all more than a little confusing to him. Then one night as he satwatching television with his host family, the announcer insisted that Bud Light was the only proper thing to serve your holiday guests. The young man with a puzzled expression turned and said to his American hosts, "What's Christmas all about, anyway? I just don't understand!"

Now we could answer that young man by saying, "Christmas is the …