Tuesday, December 11, 2007

It's time to stop being daft about Christmas

Finally, a voice of common-sense... and coming from the United Kingdom yet; the recent darling of religious political correctness.

Yesterday, Reuters reported how Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims have joined Britain's equality watchdog Monday in urging Britons to enjoy Christmas without worrying about offending non-Christians.

According to the report, Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission said, "It's time to stop being daft about Christmas. It's fine to celebrate and it's fine for Christ to be star of the show."

"Let's stop being silly about a Christian Christmas," he said, referring to a tendency to play down the traditional celebrations of the birth of Christ for fear of offending minorities in multicultural Britain.

The article goes on to cite Hindu, Sikh and Muslim leaders affirming this call to return to a modicum of common-sense. This mirrors moves by stores here in North America such as Walmart to return referring to Christmas in products and around its stores this holiday season. Sure, the moves by these stores were driven in part by the threats of boycotts, but I am hopeful that it also marks a turning in the road. Hey, it's Christmas. I can be hopeful if I want to.

2 comments:

nachtwache said...

I agree.In Canada people of other faiths have said the same thing in the past. I find that it's usually people that hate Christianity that fight "Christmas", not people that have a different faith.

Anonymous said...

It's nice to see that the hindus, sikhs and muslims, along with the government, have granted permission to celebrate Christmas, at least in the UK.


There's a big hint in here for us - it ought to be 'offensive' (in the sense of being challenging to their accepted beliefs) to them and the world - this is GOD WITH US.

But then, 'Christmas' as we know it today (and the one they want us to celebrate) is a sad parody of the Christian festival of Advent (with elements of nearby St Nicholas day mixed in).

It's up to us as Christians - which religious festival will we celebrate this year? The christo-pagan 'Christmas', or Advent?

Blessings to you Glenn,
Nick