Actually although I am very much against Government celebration of religious holidays, I would not object to the closing of givernment insititutions on those major Religious holidays that most of the government workforce would want to be off for. After all unfortunately most of the government does these days is non-essential, it can wait. (actually we might be much better off if we gave all these government workers 365 days off every year). You see there is a difference between acknowledging the practicallity of allowing workers a day off when most of them would want one, and closing the government down to celebrate the holiday.