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1. Ebenezer Scrooge's nephew said 'I have always thought of Christmas apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that - as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely and to think of [less fortunate] people'. For a few hours a whole community starts to act on the selfless, instead of the selfish, principle and finds itself merry and glad; in commemoration of Christ's birth we make the selfless choice and put others before ourselves and are surprised to find how happy it makes us. [and Ebenezer too!] 2. 'What exactly is it you Christians do on Christmas morning?' a Jewish friend once asked. 'I have this mental image of you all gathered under a Christmas tree, rustling wrapping paper'. For a lot of us, that pretty well covers it. 3. Christmas is seen primarily as a festival for children and the family. For many people, perhaps most people, that is the whole point of it. They decorate Christmas trees, hang up stockings, stuff turkeys, even dress up as Santa Claus to make their children happy - and themselves in the process. What began as a celebration of one particular birth has opened out into a celebration of millions of births. 4. But more than half of us don't have traditional families; we don't celebrate in the traditional ways. But within us we still have a notion of the real meaning of Christmas. Unconditional love. Surrounded by loot from loved ones, listening to "The Gift of the Magi on the radio while wadding crumpled paper into the fire, some deeply generous feelings begin to stir. Feeling high-minded and crusading for a gentler, kinder Christmas, I recently asked friends over lunch whether they wouldn't rather stop giving the same gifts to the same old friends and family, and instead give the greatest gift - the gift to a stranger? Yes, they would like to give to others, but they wanted a gift to unwrap too. 'Our society is alienated enough', I heard. 'Christmas is the one time we're encouraged to make some gesture of caring to the people we care about ...' The tradition of giving among family and friends should and will live on - the actual gift being less important than the gesture, of course [No gift given with love is ever small]. But the circle should (and hopefully will) grow greater ... [then we will enjoy] the knowledge that on Christmas morning, somewhere, someone you don't know will be rustling paper too. 5. It is all very friendly ... and as such in the spirit of Dickens' Christmas, and yet there seems to be something missing the inner flame and intensity of belief from which the whole occasion derives and without which it can be little more than make-believe and mummery. For those who are not churchgoers there are only the carols to remind us ... 6. And is it true? And is it true, This most tremendous tale of all, Seen in a stained-glass window's hue, A Baby in an ox's stall? The Maker of the Stars and sea Become a Child on earth for me? And is it true? For if it is, No loving fingers tying strings Around those tissued fripperies, The sweet and silly Christmas things, Bath salts and inexpensive scent And hideous ties so kindly meant, No love that in a family dwells, No carolling in frosty air, Nor all the steeple-shaking bells Can with this single truth compare - That God was Man in Palestine And lives today in Bread and Wine.