Christmas or Xmas?

Yesterday I was at the hair salon and the hair dressers and customers got into a lively discussion on whether or not the word “Xmas” was disrespectful to Christians since it is like taking Christ out of Christmas.  I am always interested in how words change and how people understand the words.  I made the comment that I had heard that the word “Xmas” was taking Christ out of Christmas but I was not sure that was correct.  I said that the word “Xmas” probably had a different meaning when it originated.  Most of the participants in the discussion were pretty sure that “Xmas” is a way to take Christ out of Christmas.  One lady even discussed a sign that had “Xmas” in the wording and how she went in and discussed with the proprietor how this was being against Christians and the holiday of Christmas.  The sign was then changed by the proprietor.

The answer to the question is – No.  The word “Xmas” has been around for a long time and it is not taking Christ out of Christmas.

Quoted from Wikipedia (For those who are interested in the whole article here is the link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xmas.)

For those with less time because of the Christmas season here is the quick version.

“Xmas” is a common abbreviation of the word “Christmas“. It is sometimes pronounced /ˈɛksməs/, but it, and variants such as “Xtemass”, originated as handwriting abbreviations for the typical pronunciation, /ˈkrɪsməs/. The “-mas” part is from the Latin-derived Old English word for “mass“,^[1] while the “X” comes from the Greek letter Chi, which is the first letter of the Greek word Χριστός, translated as “Christ”.”