Blog post: Tridimity: Godless Christmas

Sparkly, glitter-covered, gift-wrapped, hand-crafted, luxury, name-brand, whisky-filled chocolates with a side of glazed cherries sitting smugly under an artificial tree. Is this what has become of Christmas?

Transformation of British society over the past few centuries from a position of ardent Christianity, through the Industrial Revolution, to a position of secularism and consumerism has left many citizens wondering what, exactly, it is that is being celebrated come Christmas time. Of course, the purpose of Christmas for practising Christians is to celebrate the birth of Christ and the origins of their religion. However, the gradual loss of faith within the population, throughout the past few decades in particular, and the influx of new Britons from nations whose religions and customs are very different to that of 19th Century Britain mean that our society is left with a kind of ‘Christian hangover’ and a collective preoccupation with religious traditions that is disproportionate to the number of practising Christians – and so which is not representative of contemporary British society. The mutual gift-giving traditions when placed in the context of our unfortunate modern consumer culture and the constant reinforcements via the media of the apparent importance of the Christmas tradition result in a population that is too afraid, or too unthinking, or too oppressed by the mutual obligation, to question the rationality of having every man and his dog celebrate the birth of a religion whom the majority choose not to follow in name or deed – so instead many take out credit that they cannot afford in order to perpetuate the tradition. Anybody who openly questions the relevance of the holiday is likely to be ostracised from the community or, at least, deemed ‘an oddball’ – everybody is too busy pretending that the Emperor’s new suit is very fitting. Well, I am not afraid of being regarded as an oddball, or ostracised from a community that has at its basis the persecution of homosexuals and the subjugation of women and children, and here openly address the question: is Christmas relevant in 21st Century Britain?

Less than half of all young Britons, according to the 2011 census, self-identify as nominal Christians. 1 in 5 UK Christians is aged 65 or over while 1 in 4 Britons are religiously unaffiliated and, of these, 40% are under 25 years of age. The statistics suggest that the currently observed decline in British Christianity will only increase as our older generations pass.

Marked decline of European Christianity over the past century

The world remains religiously diverse: any universal morality must take all into consideration

There are certainly some positive aspects to the nature of Christmas celebration, many of which originate not from Christianity per se but from the merging of Pagan celebrations of the winter Solstice and the gift-giving and merry-making traditions from the Roman Saturnalia; greenery, lights and charity from the Roman New Year; and, Yule logs and various foods from Germanic feasts. It is undoubtedly beneficial to have a positive event upon which to focus during the cold, wet, windy and dark winter months – an event that provides vitality and gaiety, shared among all, in the months preceding the re-birth of vitality and gaiety in nature. Notably, the aforementioned positive aspects of Christmas time are not exclusive to Christianity and would make just as much sense, or perhaps more sense, if they were to be celebrated in a secular context. Even the aspects of Christianity itself that are worth celebrating – goodwill to all and the necessity of loving one’s neighbour – are not exclusive to Christianity and are, as they ought to be, practised and celebrated in their less conspicuous but no less meaningful ways 365 days of the year. Frankly, it does not make sense to single out one day of the year – or, at a stretch, one month of the year and to proclaim that, ‘this is the period when we wish goodwill to all’.

There are, perhaps, more advantages to be had if the Christmas tradition were to evolve into a secular winter break, as may well happen over the next few decades. All of the positive aspects of Christmas may be carried over into the secular winter holiday while incorporating also the positive traditions and values espoused in other religions. By combining all that is good from each of the major world religions, and making the celebration universal, we are able to join our fellow Buddhists in celebrating the birth of the Buddha at Vesak, while celebrating positivity (the triumph of light, knowledge, goodness and hope) with our Hindu friends at Diwali, and to engage with our Jewish friends in celebrating our gratitude for the plentitude of nature at Sukkot. The single largest advantage of creating a universal, secular religion – or one which includes the positive aspects of all major world religions as well as the positive aspects of agnostic and atheist perspectives – is that it cultivates inclusiveness, unity, and, so, peace and universal human love. This kind of love transcends the exclusivity of familial, community, religious or cultural ties – the ones that state, ‘you are not part of our family, you do not belong here, are not loved here, and are not wanted here’ – because we are all part of the same human family and, indeed, are connected intimately with all life on Earth.

We, the religiously unaffiliated, see the world from a drastically different perspective from that of the traditional Christian: we recognise that life may well be alone on this planet and existing as blips of consciousness in an otherwise vast, dark, barren landscape in time and space. We realise that life and the capacity for love were born of the process of Evolution by Natural Selection – a process that is fundamentally heartless – and that love, which surely exists in all its beauty, nevertheless requires a conduit for its existence, such that once life is extinguished on Earth, so too will love be extinguished. Stranger still, perhaps, is that none of this frightens us but rather consoles us in knowing that we may rely upon our own reasoning abilities and sensibilities to investigate the Universe and our place within it. For us, life is all the more precious precisely because of its brevity, and humans therefore are more accountable to one another, since there is no interventional Deity. We do not need lavish festivals in order to appreciate the profundity of the Universe – private, quiet celebrations of the small everyday wonders of nature – will do for us. While our celebrations are unstructured, they are anything but meaningless to us.

A Godless Christmas does not have to be a loveless or meaningless Christmas. This year I will drink to freedom of thought and conscience, to my own religion (humanism), and to inclusiveness.

Wherever I go;

I am not alone;

I am hand in hand,

With my fellow human

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