Sunday, November 29, 2015

"Christmas" again


Image result for "Now they're trying to put Christ into Christmas"

While the world trembles in the face of terror and destruction, global warming and economic doom, Auckland is having a row about Christmas.

It seems an Auckland group is calling its annual end of year party a "Festive" party, deliberately avoiding the word "Christmas". Considering this would be pretty normal practice in the USA and a lot of the rest of the world, the number who are protesting the loss of "Christmas" is quite remarkable. From the national Race Relations Conciliator and the Anglican Bishop of Auckland to the worst kind of cultural bigots to get their few minutes on talk-back radio there's arisen a storm of anxiety that "their" Christmas may be taken away from them.

It's all a bit over the top. In the first place, Auckland Regional Migrant Services didn't want their essentially multi-ethnic constituency to feel excluded by the term "Christmas". That seems absolutely reasonable. Also, Christmas was originally set on the date of a pagan festival and bears no relation to any date that might ever be proved to be the birth of Jesus. And, as if that weren't enough, this country has been termed "the most secular society in the western world" by at least one observer.

I am reminded of a cartoon from the 1960s showing Christmas advertising with a tiny nativity scene sandwiched into the middle of it all outside a church. One onlooker says to another, "What will these Christians do next - now they're trying to take over Christmas".

It's not so funny. The churches in this country ran big campaigns to "put Christ back into Christmas" a few decades ago. I'm not at all sure that they did either church or society much of a service. I am not convinced that a nativity scene, probably including three kings who aren't in the bible (the "wise men" who are there should be celebrated at Epiphany rather than Christmas!) are any more meaningful than a nice blue and gold Northland beach scene with some pretty pohutukawa flowers and a simple greeting.

Projecting our faith and beliefs onto anyone else, be it ordinary New Zealand unbelievers or people who follow other faiths with commitment, is just not acceptable. In fact, come to think of it, it's not acceptable even among Christians either. Christmas may continue to be a feature of our society or it may not. But let's not kid ourselves that it has profound meaning for the great majority of us. Or that the minority who find meaning have a God-given right to thrust their views on others.

Next Sunday, I have been invited to offer what may well be one of the last opportunities to share my faith. Well, whatever it is, it won't be an in-depth reiteration of the Christmas myth. In the context of the stupid row that's going on over Christmas, think I might talk about children.

Monday, November 23, 2015

Change in the routine


We've had a wonderful couple of weeks away. We flew to Blenheim to be enthusiastically received by our first great-grandson Cohen David, rode the "Coastal Pacific" train to Christchurch, rental-drove on down to Dunedin to spent time with best friends Shirley and Joan and then trickled back up the South Island for another week in Blenheim.
Great days, gentle for the most part, with some long-standing friendships refreshed and some lovely country scenery revisited. The last day was a little exciting as we were on staff standby tickets for Auckland on the day the Methodist Conference was concluding in Blenheim. We had to wait around for a couple of hours for a long detour right down to Christchurch then Auckland - but we still got home in time for an hour or two with the village Barbershop Chorus rehearsal and cuppa.
The South Island and family and friends there will always have a special place in our hearts.  Then within a couple of days the Blenheim family were in Auckland and we got to share the custody of the G-GS with his Nana Christine for 30 hours. What a little smiler! He was passed from hand to hand and car to car with only the best of goodwill for everyone in sight. He crawled all over the place and drank in the sights of every new environment with relish. He figured how to release the three drawers I'd clipped together with a stick more quickly than your average kea. And kea outsmarted chimpanzees in a television documentary once. Just imagine: a G-GS who at eight months is smarter than a kea or a chimp...
Saturday was also our 56th wedding anniversary. What better way to celebrate it than a time of thinking with much pleasure about friends and family and life and living?
On Sunday I made a nostalgic visit back to St John's College where the Methodists had their usual monthly service. It included a farewell to Val Nicholls, a special friend who's been on the staff for the last few years. She invited me to play the piano for the service, a much appreciated gesture.

Now it's back to a couple of weeks of testing and checking as I come up to my quarterly review... And I have started serious work on my submission about Voluntary Euthanasia....