B'ah Humbug!

Ooh it's been a while hasn't it? But it is time for a strictly one off
post! It won't be around for ever and a day so enjoy it while it lasts.

I wasn't quite sure where to post this. It's something I wanted to put
in writing somewhere, and this seems as good a place as any, it's about
the Royal Wedding, and it's about Christmas. What have they got in
common you might ask?

Well let me tell you about my friend, we'll call him Tom (not his real
name), but first a bit about me as well. I am Christian, I am a
moderate, liberal Christian with definite universalist sympathies, but a
Christian at the end of the day, and I quite like Christmas, both the
religious side and the more secular partying side. I get irritated with
the build up and having it shoved down my throat from mid August
onwards, but come the day I'm there with the Christmas pud and crackers.

Tom though is different, Tom is a staunch atheist. I don't mean the sort
that simply don't believe in God and it's no big deal, no I mean the
sort who is passionately atheist. He can't bare religion, he's not a
Richard Dawkins type (although he's a fan) who will go out of his way to
argue with you, instead he goes massively out of his way to avoid
anything religious. So Christmas is not a good time for Tom. He tries to
hide from it, he tries to avoid it, there's no Christmas dinner in the
Tom household, he'd rather work if only his employer was open on the
day.

Now I've always though, quietly, that Tom is a miserable so and so on
this issue, until recently.

You see I am a republican, not one that just ignores the whole royal
circus, but one who actively wants change. This is not the time and
place to debate the rights and wrongs of that argument, just take it as
read that I want an elected head of state and end to the current system.
I try to keep away from it, I try to ignore media stories about the
royals and try to take no notice, but it's always there. And in recent
months, with this endless build up to tomorrow's wedding it's become
harder than ever.

And it's made me suddenly have a huge amount of empathy with Tom, and
realise why he is such a miserable sod about Christmas, because I am
exactly the same about this wedding.

In the same way that Tom has no problem with me having a happy Christmas
and does not wish ill on my kind then if the wedding and the royals is your
thing I hope you have a fantastic time tomorrow, I really do. I hope
that the happy couple are very happy together, it's no skin off my nose.

Just please understand that I have now had weeks and months of every
corner of the media shoving it down my throat. In the same way that Tom
sees the Christmas lights go up I have seen the bunting go up. I have
been invited to parties I don't really want to go to to celebrate
something I don't believe in, just like him.

I don't care, I'm not interested and I cannot wait until it is all over.

Have any Daily Mail readers ever read the Bible?

This may sound like a strange title for a blog post but it's an important one. You see as regular readers are aware I am a Christian. I am on the pink and fluffy, pretty liberal, live and let live wing of Christianity, (we do exist, it just seems that often we are few and far between) but still a Christian at that, that's right I believe that Jesus was the son of God.

Anyway, the Jesus I believe in, as described by the gospels, was an individual who didn't have a huge amount of time for the establishment, for traditions and how things were done. He spent time with tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers. He was a refugee himself. He had few if any possessions and sought to provide for the poor and treat the sick.

Even if you are not a Christian, even if you are of no religion at all, even if you think that the whole thing is a lot of hocus pocus, you must admit that the Jesus portrayed in the Bible was a pretty good egg.

So where is this going?

Well take a look at this story in the Mail

Now the story itself, while poorly written and a bit incoherent, is pretty balanced. Yet lets take a look at some comments shall we?

Total nonsense. Time these silly vicars got back to basics instead of trying to be politically correct. No wonder churches are empty!
Click to rate Rating 7
- GB, England, 11/12/2008 17:55

So GB thinks that a priest trying to emulate Jesus and bring attention to those at the bottom is politically correct. Sorry GB but I thought that following the example of Jesus was exactly what they were meant to do.

Not even funny. Leave our traditions alone.
Click to rate Rating 1
- Renee, Melbourne, Australia, 11/12/2008 19:06

Sorry Renee, but much like Jesus himself the job of priests is not to protect tradition but to spread the word of God and the example of Jesus. Do you think churches are there just to look pretty?

Stop 'getting with it' and leave well alone, too many on the bandwagon changing everything.....What for?
Click to rate Rating 14
- Ross, Bucks, 11/12/2008 19:35

What for? To do as Jesus did you twat.

The 'less fortunate' eh? At least six of the new items are self-inflicted. Fortune not only favours the brave, it favours the clean-living. And besides, GT of Belgium is right, it isn't a religious ditty so has no place in church. Oh, how I hate trendiness in the church. I stopped going to church when the choir started wearing jeans and tee-shirts and strumming their 'geetars' and we were all encouraged to hug the person beside us whether we knew them from Adam or not. Church is a place of quiet prayer and solemnity for me. Sorry to be so old fashioned, but there it is. I feel that this modernity has helped to destroy church-going, because there's as much racket there as anywhere else. B&Q is the new C of E for a lot of folk.
Click to rate Rating 7
- Kathy Bianco, Kensington, London., 11/12/2008 20:07

Arsehole, pure and simple.

The Rev. George Fisher, should remember that he is a disciple, who's job is to go out and spread the word of God.....not waste time re-writing the words and context of a Christmas song, that has nothing to do with the church....it is just another song that is sung at Chrismas. With religious ministers such as Rev, Fisher, it is no wonder that people are leaving the church in droves.
Click to rate Rating 6

- Max, Hampshire, 12/12/2008 3:11

Priceless Max, fucking priceless. What do you think the word of God is? have you ever heard of "love thy neighbour"? Have you read the bible?

The people in this song are exactly the people who Jesus would have spent his time with if he was on earth today, exactly the sort. And Christmas, or the Christian Christmas anyway, is about celebrating the birth of Jesus. The traditions are neither here nor there, maybe it's time some Mail readers started remembering that.

Happy Christmas

Hi all, Christmas is coming and there are people in the blogosphere who I would like to send a Christmas card to but given that I don't know you in the real world I can't. So instead I shall be making a donation to one of my favourite charities, East Anglian Childrens Hospice (EACH) on your behalf. EACH are amazing people who do so much for young people who lives are threatened by serious illness and I simply can't plug them enough.

So this is for people like Putz, Snuffy, 5CC and Anonymous with their regular and not so regular comments plus IPP who I know reads it and may comment one day! Plus there are others who I know visit like the people from Farnborough and Kirklees and Akron who regularly visit but stay silent. And of course the various blogs who have linked to me either permanently or occasionally.

Happy Christmas to you all!

Today is the day.

It is the day that I noticed that Christmas lights had started going up in town.

It is the day that my friend noticed the first Christmas tree up at the local bowling alley.

And it is the day that I heard for the first time since last Christmas that bloody song by wizzard.

I am utterly astonished.