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Christmas Celebrated Around The World; Officials: 2M Healthcare.gov Visitors Monday; U.S. Embassy Attacked By Taliban; 50 U.S. Marines Deployed To Uganda; Pussy Riot Remains Defiant After Release; Pope: Shun Pride And Selfishness; Mall Visitors See Familiar Santa; Remembering The Meaning Of Christmas
Aired December 25, 2013 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN CNAHOR: Good morning to you. I'm Carol Costello. Thanks so much for being with me. There's a lot of news going on. But before I get to that, I want to wish you a very merry Christmas.
As the sun rises across the country, Christians celebrate with both revelry and reverence. In Washington the families of service members remember their loved ones both at the city's war memorials.
U.S. Troops on active duty across the world also marked this holiday. They paused to celebrate and to reflect.
In the Philippines, church-goers remembered those lost to last month's deadly hurricane. Worshipers lit candles in tribute and relied on that candlelight, because electricity has still not been fully restored.
In Australia, far from the North Pole, revelers celebrated in the surf and on the sand. Santa parked the reindeer and padded around in flip-flops to deliver gifts --
* CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: -- relied on that candlelight because electricity has still not been fully restored.
In Australia, far from the North Pole, revelers celebrated in the surf and on the sand. Santa parked the reindeer, and padded around in flip-flops to deliver good cheer.
And in China, Christmas is not so much a religious holiday as it is a wacky excuse to celebrate, kind of like St. Patrick's Day here in the United States, but China's government does take pride in its massive exports of toys, saying without its cheap products, Americans couldn't enjoy those piles of gifts under the tree.
In Hawaii, President Obama is celebrating the holiday with family and friends. Today he and the first lady released this special message about the spirit of the season.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: So many people all across the country are helping out in soup kitchens, buying gifts for children in need, organizing food or clothing drives for their neighbors. For families like ours, that service is a chance to celebrate the birth of Christ and live out what he taught us, to love our neighbors as we love ourselves, to feed the hungry and look after the sick, to be our brother's keeper and our sister's keeper.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Athena Jones is traveling with the president. She joins us live from Honolulu. Good morning, Athena.
ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Carol. Merry Christmas.
COSTELLO: Merry Christmas. There is a bit of good news for President Obama this Christmas day. Lots of people were signing up for Obamacare, more than ever, but I don't know if that says very much, but you tell us more.
JONES: Well, what we have learned over the last several days, Carol, is that a lot of Americans are last-minute shoppers, even when it comes to health care. The state exchanges and the federal exchange healthcare.gov has seen a big surge in visitors as people were scrambling to try to sign up for coverage before the deadlines even though the deadlines have been shifting coverage that starts January 1st.
Health officials said that Monday was a record day for healthcare.gov, 2 million visitors to the site, 250,000 calls into the call centers. Tuesday's numbers were also high, officials said though not quite as high as Monday. I should mention the administration says they're doing everything they can to help those folks who made their, quote, "best efforts" to sign up for health coverage, but weren't able to finish that process by midnight last night, which was the modified deadline.
Those folks will still be able to get help through a customer service representative, to help them complete that process and get coverage that starts at the beginning of January. Now state exchanges I mentioned have also seen big jumps in traffic. Colorado had a record day on Monday. That same day Connecticut saw twice the number of signups they usually see. California had a daily total of 27,000 people signing up for coverage on a single day. That's Sunday in California.
New York has also seen a big jump. So it's all good news for the administration, especially since those early problems with healthcare.gov, but I should note it probably look like they're still not likely to meet their original goal of 3.3 million signing up by now.
So good news, of course, we'll have to wait for the final numbers in the days after the Christmas and in January to get the numbers for December. So still good news, but we'll see if they meet that Target -- Carol.
COSTELLO: All right, Athena Jones, thanks so much.
The Taliban claiming responsibility for a morning attack on the U.S. embassy in Kabul, two rounds of indirect fire hit the U.S. embassy compound. American diplomats say no one was hurt. Now this attack comes as the United States and Afghanistan are working on a post-2014 plan for a U.S. military presence in that country.
Also this morning, one of the Navy SEAL was injured in a rescue attempt in South Sudan this weekend. He is on his way to a military hospital in Germany. Nearly 400 Americans have been evacuated from that country so far after violence has spread across the region. A group of 50 Marines have been deployed to Uganda to be on standby if more evacuations are needed there. CNN's Fred Pleitgen is in New York with more for you. Good morning.
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Carol, and Merry Christmas to you. Yes, the U.S, of course, is ramping its efforts to protect American interest there in South Sudan. Of course, the focus of all of that, the centrepiece of all that is the U.S. Embassy in the capital of Juba they don't want the situation like they had in Benghazi when a consulate there was attacked.
So what they are doing is they have moved about 150 Marines from Spain into Djibouti and then they moved 50 of those as you said even further forward to Uganda for them to be able to get into South Sudan as fast as possible if the situation should warrant that. Now what the U.S. is saying is that they believe pretty much all Americans by now have left South Sudan, however, there are still people who have not left the country there.
They are urging them to get out of the country as fast as possible to get in touch with the U.S. Embassy in the capital city because they believe the situation there seems to continue to deteriorate. What we are hearing from on the ground, Carol, is there is increased fighting going on in the north of the country, in the center of the country, and of course, the situation in the capital where the U.S. Embassy is located is very unstable as well.
At the same time, however, Carol, America's also ramping up its efforts to get the two sides, the rebels and the government to the table to get them to stop talking so that they can avert what they believe could be something close to genocide if the situation gets out of control -- Carol.
COSTELLO: All right, Fred Pleitgen, reporting live for us this morning.
Despite being locked up in a Russian prison for nearly two years, the newly freed members of the band "Pussy Riot," say they will not back down. They plan on continuing the fight against what they call the Putin system. Two women reunited after their release. They sat down with CNN's Diana Magnay to talk about how they coped in prison and their hopes for Russia in the future.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NADEZHDA TOLOKONNIKOVA, FREED PUSSY RIOT MEMBER (through translator): Nothing special. We managed to keep our personal freedom inside even when we were imprisoned. We always wanted to change things around for us for the better, so now we are free. Our work just continues.
MARIA ALYOKHINA, FREED PUSSY RIOT MEMBER (through translator): It's just a different environment. Prison is the place where you feel freedom the most of. Freedom is inside you.
DIANA MAGNAY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: What should the world know what it's like to be a prisoner in President Putin's prison system here and how should they react?
ALYOKHINA (through translator): I think the world needs to know that there are not much changes from Soviet times. If the Ministry of Justice released a new order, it would be an exact copy from the one from Soviet times. We are going to change this.
TOLOKONNIKOVA (through translator): I want to add that it's not just the two of us who are going to change this. We're going to have a team, a big organization. We already have lawyers who have been helping us and working with us since we were jailed. Now they will also investigate the violations that we recorded, and we're asking Russian citizens to provide us with information of any violations they're aware of to help in this.
ALYOKHINA (through translator): Changes have begun, but you need to constantly work on them. The Russian system is designed in such a way that without social control, it will die immediately because the people in the system will try to use every possibility to escape from their obligation and responsibilities.
MAGNAY: This all came about as a protest against the Russian president. What future do you see for Putin's Russia and what future do you see for yourselves within that system?
TOLOKONNIKOVA (through translator): Of course, we would like to live in the future with no Putin system, where we would have a democratic transparent system, with no corruption, with no hatred in society that's all -- for example, the gays or the west. There's too much hatred in this country. We would like to help it become more humane, but I'm afraid it's impossible with Putin in power.
MAGNAY: You know what happens to critics of the Russian president. You have been through the hell of what you have just described. Are you not scared of what may happen?
ALYOKHINA (through translator): No way. We're not afraid of them. They're the ones who should be afraid of us.
MAGNAY: Now two years after your performance in the cathedral, what is your message to President Putin?
ALYOKHINA (through translator): We're making him go away. TOLOKONNIKOVA (through translator): We were not defeated because we had our own victories over the system. You can't make us silent. If you want us in Mordovia, you'll have us there. But it will be the same mistake, we guarantee you.
MAGNAY: How do you make up for these lost years in the lives of your children? Do you ever regret what you did?
ALYOKHINA (through translator): I think we will have a story to tell our children. The moral choice we made is the best educational example we could give them.
TOLOKONNIKOVA (through translator): We hope to see changes for the better, just small ones, because our children will grow up in this country. We're not going to leave. The choice we made was made for our children also.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Wow. OK. I'm humbled.
Still to come in the NEWSROOM, the pope delivers his first Christmas message to the world. Catholics and non-Catholics are listening to this increasingly popular world figure
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: This morning a milestone of sorts at the Vatican where Francis watched over his first Christmas celebration as pope. His message both simple and in keeping with basic values. CNN's Erin McLaughlin has more for you.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ERIN MCLAUGHLIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As you can see they are streaming into St. Peters Square. People from all over the world, pilgrims and atheists, men, women and children of a multitude of religions, flooding the square to hear what Pope Francis has to say to the world on Christmas Day.
POPE FRANCIS (through translator): God is peace. Let us ask him to help us be peacemakers each day.
MCLAUGHLIN: What did you think of the pope's message?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wonderful, it was beautiful, very touching, and I felt even like crying. He's a very humble person.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I really don't know if humanity will listen, but he is strong to say this.
MCLAUGHLIN: His message delivered in Italian, even though not everyone here understands exactly what he's saying, they're here to see him and to experience history.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Wonderful to be in such a large crowd. We were all from many different countries. People were happy to be here and calm about it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was a great moment to see him speak to all the people. It's a lovely day here in Rome, a great experience.
MCLAUGHLIN: His message to the world, one of peace. He asked for prayers for the victims of conflict in places like Syria and the South Sudan. It was a message that really seemed to resonate here in the square, the excitement and energy was palpable, an illustration of the power of Pope Francis. Erin McLaughlin, CNN, The Vatican.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Back in this country, families who take their children to see Santa at the Baldwin Hills Mall don't think about a recent media debate on the shade of a skin, they feel good seeing a familiar face. CNN's Kyung Lah reports from South Central Los Angeles.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KYUNG LAH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The heart of every mall at Christmas -- elves, cameras, crying babies. All to see the obligatory mall Santa, but it's a rare sort of Santa at the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza in South Los Angeles.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We came to see the black Santa.
LAH: He draws crowds of pint-sized pre-schoolers and their patient parents.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Merry Christmas.
LAH: Just like every Santa in any mall in America, the pictures are characteristically Christmas. At the same time they're not.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When I was little there was no black Santa in Chicago in 1953.
LAH (on camera): So it's important for them to see this.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, it is.
LAH (voice-over): Turn on the TV, all you see is one shade of Santa. Like most benevolent characters American children grow up seeing. The good guy is white, but not at this mall. Others speak Spanish, 77- year-old Lincoln Patterson has greeted the crowd, plopping toddlers on his lap, whose parents want her snapshot to mean more than just a commercial card.
TYRONE LAMONT, PARENT: Kids don't see no color. I don't think so. I didn't see color when I was little. You only see color when you get older.
LAH (on camera): Nearly all this shoppers in this mall are African- American or Latino. There are only a handful of them in the entire country.
(voice-over): That's why Santa himself has a wish this Christmas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The malls next year will have a few ethnic Santa Clauses in all cultures.
LAH (voice-over): Dreaming of a white Christmas and one in many other shades.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, sweetie.
LAH: Kyung Lah, CNN, Los Angeles.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: Still to come in the NEWSROOM, remembering the true meaning of Christmas. We'll discuss whether the so-called war on Christmas really starts at home? We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COSTELLO: Christmas is the time of year when we're supposed to come together to celebrate our family and our faith and to promote our new start up business?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The biggest thing is what happens next, next month he's stepping off the anchor desk, the biggest decision of his life. He's going to come to work with his wife, making videos like these.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COSTELLO: Sure they're in the Christmas jammies, but are they taking advantage of the holiday? Using it to make money instead of focusing on making memories? Earlier I spoke with CNN religion commentator, Father Beck, and Russell Moore, the president of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission about the changing meaning of Christmas.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: So we always like to think, Father Beck, that back in the day Christmas meant so much more and through the years it's become so much commercialized. Is it our imagination, or is that true?
REV. EDWARD BECK, CNN RELIGION COMMENTATOR: Well, if you think way, way back, Carol, remember, it started really as a secular feast. It wasn't until 300 years after Christ was dead that we started celebrating Christmas. It used to be a celebration of the harvest feast and the winter solstice. So when they decided, the early church they were going to celebrate Christmas now, they kind of melded with the celebration that was already happening, and said let's celebrate the birth of Christ at the darkest time of year, which is the winter solstice.
So really we co-opted a festival that was already happening, so let's remember that part, but traditionally, I think, what's happened is yes, it has become more commercial, because we have gotten away from the root, the simplicity of a homeless teenager giving birth to a child in a stable, and that that's what it's about. That God comes to us in that kind of simplicity. We've allowed it to be become much more than that, with all the gift giving, the commercialism and we've lost the true spirit of what is meant to be celebrated.
COSTELLO: Well, Russell, I'll ask you this question then. I agree with Father Beck, I think it has become more commercialized and we are forgetting what Christmas really means, but why has it gotten worse over the years?
RUSSELL MOORE, SOUTHERN BAPTIST ETHICS AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY COMMISSION: Well, I'm not sure that it's gotten worse. I think in just about every generation people are complaining that people have forgotten what Christmas is about and it's too commercial and too consumeristic. I think in many ways some of our concerns about Christmas have to do with our concerns about the whole of our lives, just the hustle and bustle of everything that when Christmas comes along, buying gifts for one another is just one more piece of a list that just seems to go on and on.
One of the things I think that may make that more intense is our connectiveness. I was sitting here and didn't have my phone for a few minutes, and I felt antsy because I was disconnected from what was going on. I think as time speeds on and our schedules become busier and busier, we tend to see that at Christmas, perhaps more than we do the rest of the time, and I also think we have an expectation that Christmas ought to be this perfect, gauzy tinsel-filled time when we're all at peace with one another and the reality of a fallen world falls short of that.
COSTELLO: So Father Beck, how can we teach our children to celebrate Christmas as, you know, we ought to even though we don't?
BECK: Well, I have a cousin who has a rule with his kids. They can have ten toys total in the house. Whenever they get a new one, they have to give one away. He's teaching them that some people don't have anything. TV pundits are intent on saying we have a war on Christmas. I think we do have a war on Christmas, Carol, but it's not about whether we say Merry Christmas or happy holidays or whether you set up a nativity in a public space.
It's taking Christ out of the Christmas and forgetting what Christ message was. It was for the poor. It was for the outcasts, and until we remember that and start attending to the poor, that's how you put Christ back in Christmas. Do you think Jesus cares whether we say Merry Christmas or happy holidays? I don't think so. I think Jesus cares are we feeding the hungry, clothing the naked? This is what his message was.
COSTELLO: That kind of message, Russell, that could be taught by outside forces, can it? That has to be taught in the home.
MOORE: It has to be taught in the home and in our churches, and part of that I think means re-claiming what Christmas actually is about, and teaching that to our children, that this is about God who came to be with us, and I think that also means that we take a bit of the holly jolly edge off of Christmas and re-claim the strangeness of Christmas. The Christmas story is a story of a God who came into this world in human flesh, and there was a lot of opposition, a lot of darkness coming against him.
Some of our older Christmas songs kept sort of that expectation that we were longing for the coming up Christ. We're groaning in a world where so many things have gone wrong, but we can be reconciled to God and through each other to the person of Christ. I think we need to be teaching that in our homes, and preaching that.
COSTELLO: It just struck me. Last night I was watching the Peanuts Christmas special. It's very religious, and really does get into the true meaning of Christmas, but modern tales about Christmas certainly don't go there. You have to wonder why, Father Beck.
BECK: I think we have to remember, Carol, we are in a multicultural pluralistic society, and I think that's OK. The point is Christians should celebrate it, celebrate it well and get to the true meaning of Christmas. I understand when people feel as though maybe Christmas is shoved down their throats if you're not Christians. I mean, our country is founded not on religious beliefs, but on equality and for all people. I think it's important to remember that. I think the best way that Christians keep Christ in Christmas is to act like Christians.
COSTELLO: I'll give you the last word, Russell.
MOORE: Well, I think it's true that we need to make sure that in our own communities that we're keeping Christ in Christmas, and I think we need to be raising up a new generation, to constantly say this isn't just about all the who down in Newville, joining hands in signing, it's about God rest ye merry gentlemen. That Jesus has come in the flesh. It's increasingly counter-cultural, but I think we do it in a joyful way, that God has done something glorious that's good news.
COSTELLO: Thank you both for the wonderful conversation. Father Edward Beck, Russell Moore, I really appreciate it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COSTELLO: A good conversation, wasn't it? Still to come in the NEWSROOM, on the run, but on the air, we'll tell you why fugitive American, Edward Snowden, addressed TV viewers across the ocean today.
