yeah and there in lies the problem... I would rather it not be abbreviated in any form or time. To me, it takes away the special significance and meaning of the word "Christ". I could call a Russian machine gun an AK47 and it wouldn't matter to most people in the know but to folks who have no clue then AK47 would have less meaning than "Russian Machine Gun".... Abbreviations not only strip letters and symbols out of words but they also tend to strip out the full meanings.
here's the thing though, the Chi-Rho and the letter X has been used for well over a thousand years to represent
Christos. The use of symbols in our language to represent other meanings is nothing new or offensive.
For example:
Old English had a letter that we call a Thorn. (It looks like a weird P) Over time, use of the sound of thorn was replaced by our current "th". However, in print this letter slowly evolved, and for a while in it's history took on the look of a Y. When the first King James bible was printed in 1611 multiple passages replaced the Thorn with a more modern Y because the Thorn letter wasn't always available to printers, but Y (being used in Germany where many printing presses were made) was. Thus the word "Ye" was born (Pronounced? The.) Now-a-days you can go to "ye olde inne" or whatever and it's supposed to be archaic and fun. However, it's simply a modern interpretation of an old letter.
In fact, it's where our modern day 'YOU" comes from. Originally, this would have been spelled Thorn (P)ou and pronounced
thou. As the printing changed and the Thorn was switched to a Y, it became
you.
For well over a thousand years, we have abbreviated the Ch-Rho into the letter X because it is simpler and easier. It's not disrespectful, it's not taking Christ out of anything. It's just a different way of doing things. Much like if I wrote Ye instead of The.
The English language naturally evolves into it's simplest form over the course of thousands of years. It's been happening since the language was "born" and continues to happen to this day.
But really when it comes down to is, why ask somebody to change they way they type or speak simply because you disagree with history?
-- He was one dude that I never understood when I was a kid and still don't understand. -- I spend enough time trying to figure myself out without having to try to figure out some entertainer from days gone by. Heck, he might have been the most wonderful person on the planet for all I know --- I am just not going to spend my time worrying about it.
